Metagame SV OU Metagame Discussion v4 [Volcarona Banned]

[PolloAriosto]

Terapagos: in my opinion let it stay for a bit (at least 1 week), don't overreact and QB it instantly. I think it enjoys the fact that it is an unique pokemon and many ways to play against it have not been discovered. For now I think HO fest makes it more bearable, as it absolutely hates hazards, knock, status and taunt, as well as hard hitters. The low PP of its signature move can also be exploited, and it must be remembered that its goob form is costs your tera.

: really strong set up guy, knock + acro is still amazing and booster speed is very useful for the other many booster mons (tho still slower than iron shoulder)

Iron Shoulder: this is kinda insane, maybe this is why they hadnt given us an accurate rock move lol. I expect this to be one of the top dogs

: really liking it, I'm using boots 3atk +hypnosis and sometimes it feels really unfair. I think people might have underestimated this considering how much annoying support it can use alongside good offensive presence

: very disappointed, 113 speed is indeed too slow rn

Use it's fun

 

[SittinGamer]

i wish I could find a proper example so im not talking out of my ass.

Pretty sure this applied/applies to ADV Mr. Mime. Thanks for the history lesson, Jimothy Cool.

 

[peepeepoopoo722]

How many pokemon have been banned due to stored power and is there ever a time we look at it as the problem?

Would that save the turtle? Would it have saved espartha or magearna? End of dlc1 people mentioned manaphy set using stored power. Any others?


Or does it need to be centralizing on every user meaning we would need the weakest unevolved user of it to also be OP before we look at it? I'm guessing there are baton pass users that wouldn't be top OU threats with baton pass too.

 

[taziathegreat]

Should have made Terapagos Ubers first lol. I wonder how they didn't think 160/110/110 bulk with a 120bp omni tera would be legal in ou

in their defense we didn’t know exactly how terapagos worked until hours before it was implemented on showdown , hell it’s possible somethings still wrong

 

[SittinGamer]

I think Stored Power is a powerful wincon but not worth banning. The only mon which was truly devilish with it was the funny Emu, and that was very much in part due to Speed Boost. Terapagos Stellar would be (and is) banworthy without Stored Power, and many other mons run the move to a healthy degree. Manaphy is (was?) likely unhealthy without Stored Power, and Pokemon like Cresselia or Hatterene are not broken with it.

 

[ianlazerbeem]

Should have made Terapagos Ubers first lol. I wonder how they didn't think 160/110/110 bulk with a 120bp omni tera would be legal in ou

They voted on it when we all had no idea how stellar worked, and Zamazenta and Darkrai are living proof BST isn't everything, esp since that bulk is backed with no reliable recovery. 3 days tops out of god knows how long people will play this meta is not a big deal

 

[KamenOH]

I have something devious planned. If i can win with just Terapagos, then yeah ill probably call it stupid and want it gone. No better way for me to change my mind i think, so:
What EVs should i use? Is any speed worth investing, or should I go all SpA/Def because calm mind is wack? Gonna try rest talk because fuck it might as well. Starstorm or whatever is gonna clap while I rest up.

 

[Magcargo]

Idk, I personally like Terapagos's presence in the meta, but I'm in the minority. This shit is strong but it's no bloodmoon, even when Tera'd. I'd say this mon requires Rest to be "broken" but it has a lot of nice value in keeping threats like Dengo in check while not being overly difficult to answer defensively. Pokemon like Spdef Toxapex, Haze Clodsire, and Unaware Clef are easier to justify running rn and I'd say all do fine vs the CM variant. Without Rest, this mon gets Toxic Sralled quite easily.

Idk maybe people are running bad sets rn and stuff like specs are broken, but I think this mon needs more time.

I have something devious planned. If i can win with just Terapagos, then yeah ill probably call it stupid and want it gone. No better way for me to change my mind i think, so:
What EVs should i use? Is any speed worth investing, or should I go all SpA/Def because calm mind is wack? Gonna try rest talk because fuck it might as well. Starstorm or whatever is gonna clap while I rest up.

Restalk CM mono Tera Starstorm is my favorite set. Max HP and Def investment.

 

[Drifting]

Idk why people here are acting like Darkrai isn’t amazing. I’ve just been running Life Orb 4 Attacks and it practically 6-0’s ~2/3 matches by itself if you hit a focus blast because it just kills everything. I’ve also seen Wide Lens Hypnosis+NP sets just win on lead. The difference in power between Darkrai and the average OU mon is very apparent, and apart from turtle (which is frankly absurd) it’s the only thing I think needs to go sooner rather than later

 

[Morkal]

Idk why people here are acting like Darkrai isn’t amazing. I’ve just been running Life Orb 4 Attacks and it practically 6-0’s ~2/3 matches by itself if you hit a focus blast. I’ve also seen Wide Lens Hypnosis+NP sets just win on lead. The difference in power between Darkrai and the average OU mon is very apparent, and apart from turtle (which is frankly absurd) it’s the only thing I think needs to go sooner rather than later

I couldn't disagree more - Darkrai is aggressively setup reliant on anything that isn't LO four attacks, and often the power differential just doesn't pay off the required dividends. NP LO with Three Attacks is great, but having to rely on Focus Blast or Tera along with missing critical thresholds is not only keeping Darkrai out of the realm of being broken, but is frankly making it a little underwhelming. It's still great, don't get me wrong, but nowhere near as busted as things like Serp or Turtle, or really busted at all to tell you the truth. Darkrai's an A-/A mon imo, not broken

 

[Moyashi]

This shit is strong but it's no bloodmoon, even when Tera'd. I'd say this mon requires Rest to be "broken" but it has a lot of nice value in keeping threats like Dengo in check while not being overly difficult to answer defensively. Pokemon like Spdef Toxapex, Haze Clodsire, and Unaware Clef are easier to justify running rn and I'd say all do fine vs the CM variant

It’s on par, if not worse to deal with than BM. It’s very difficult to answer defensively and incredibly tough to break offensively too. Clodsire and toxapex (especially to apex) aren’t good right now, and clef is better off running magic guard.

 

[bigasschungusboi]

This exact bs is what i feared whenever a mon gets unbanned and let into ou, constant back and forth between people who think its broken and people who think that it's not and the mon is talked to death and nothing else is ever discussed.

Especially with a mon like Darkrai that has so much emotions behind that people are willing to go any length to defend and downplay it so it can remain a part of the tier all in all its hasn't even been 2 or more days so both sides should just chill regarding this.

 

[KamenOH]

Idk, I personally like Terapagos's presence in the meta, but I'm in the minority. This shit is strong but it's no bloodmoon, even when Tera'd. I'd say this mon requires Rest to be "broken" but it has a lot of nice value in keeping threats like Dengo in check while not being overly difficult to answer defensively. Pokemon like Spdef Toxapex, Haze Clodsire, and Unaware Clef are easier to justify running rn and I'd say all do fine vs the CM variant. Without Rest, this mon gets Toxic Sralled quite easily.

Idk maybe people are running bad sets rn and stuff like specs are broken, but I think this mon needs more time.


Restalk CM mono Tera Starstorm is my favorite set. Max HP and Def investment.

Im 2 battles in, and 2 losses. Leading with Tusk, or using Curse/Encore/any of them moves cements my loss. maybe trying to 6/0 teams alone was a bad idea

Edit: good god taunt kills me
Fuck. Maybe im just bad

 

[Morkal]

This exact bs is what i feared whenever a mon gets unbanned and let into ou, constant back and forth between people who think its broken and people who think that it's not and the mon is talked to death and nothing else is ever discussed.

Especially with a mon like Darkrai that has so much emotions behind that people are willing to go any length to defend and downplay it so it can remain a part of the tier all in all its hasn't even been 2 or more days so both sides should just chill regarding this.

At the same time, there's an outpouring of "so much emotion" for people who have an idea that a mon is "Uber" due to mental association and nostalgic bias. It should go without question that, since Darkrai is my favorite Pokemon, I'd like it to remain in OU - but that bias does not affect my view as to whether or not I feel it's broken (Darkrai has felt very underwhelming so far). As an example, Serperior is also one of my favorite Pokemon, and I want that matchup-fishing demon gone from the OU tier ASAP as I feel it's overwhelming. Arguments like this feel very dismissive and do nothing but further how people get pitted against one another.

 

[Cuddly]

This kind of explains functionally what the difference is.

That explains it for most Megas, but not Mega Ray as its mega form was tied to having a move, which said move was not banned itself in Ubers.
The real difference is that there isn’t a real difference and Smogon doesn’t have consistent rules or tiering policy.
You got;
-Sleep Clause that breaks ingame mechanics intentionally
-Freeze Clause that breaks ingame mechanics intentionally and only in older gens
-Evasion Clause you’d think naturally includes all forms of boosting your evasion on its own (ie not Contrary Defog) but nah. You can still boost evasion with some luck and evasion boosting abilities/items were unbanned for some time
-Evasion/OHKO Clause were added despite both strategies ultimately being ass because they don’t want to encourage gambling but are perfectly fine with other forms of RNG that functionally do the same or are in same spirit despite being better (ie. Glare, Thunder Wave, Static).
-Refusing to ban baton pass for a surprising amount of time
-Gen 5 weather wars with Drizzle and Swift Swim
-Plenty of other examples
Smogon isn’t perfect and really far from many of their goals *cough* fix sleep clause *cough* *cough* add more RNG clauses *cough*

Me personally really don’t care. Terapagos‘s regular form is partly why Stellar form is busted. Tera Shell is so good with Terapagos, that with no investment, I’m pretty sure the only things that are guaranteed OHKOs on it are
-Mold Breaker Pokemon/effects (duh)
-Specs Tera Water Kyogre
-Specs Chi-Yu in the Sun
-Specs Charizard also in the Sun and with Modest
You can even potentially tank a Tera Psychic Modest Psycho Boost from Deoxys-Attack.
I assume that Stellar form would still be broken if you Tera immediately, but because Tera Shell and its base form are core part of making Stellar Terapagos so broken, I’d say it warrents banning both.

 

[Eeveeto]

Day 1 of playing the meta.

Terapagos should be banned, entirely. Everyone already talked about it, I don,t care whether its only Stellar form or entirely, this Mon doesn,t bring almost anything positive to OU and has way too many options to sweep entire teams.

Deoxys-S is also pretty cancerous. If all of them were just suicide leads, it would be fine and predictable. But no, it has Screen sets, LO sets and Nasty Plot sets, all while outspeeding the whole meta. It makes HO an even better playstyle than it already is.

Those are the 2 obvious Quick Ban candidates. The next ones would be Blaziken and Gouging Fire, for now their effect to the meta is overshadowed by the above 2, but they will be breaking the meta soon.

Roaring Moon and Gliscor for now look fine, but are also Mons I don,t see any reason to retest in OU, they make the game less fun, even if that by itself is not enough of a reason to ban.

Haven,t seen much Volcaronas, so can,t comment.

Darkrai on the other hand looks fine, especially since it actually is more of a problem versus HO teams than a threat in them. Has common checks and severe 4 slots syndrome.

Serperior is good but not even remotely broken.

Iron Boulder has broken Tier stats... but most of the time can,t get past Dondozo. Also can,t OHKO Gambit with unboosted EQ while Air Balloon is a set. Many weaknesses too.

Speaking about Gambit, when are we suspecting that guy again?

I have lost to Raging Bolt a couple of games but this Mon still looks pretty undewhelming vs anything that is not a hard HO. Slow, not too bulky and somehow with coverage problems. You love to see legendaries with bad coverage these days.

Lastly, even with Stellar Terapagos in the Meta, Sun looks pretty insane unless you take it into account in the builder. Maybe not only Gouging Fire will have to get banned in the future, but also Walking Wake.

 

[KamenOH]

My results are disappointing, and im almost certain they reflect more on me than the mon. 8 PP is exploitable, as are its weaknesses to tauntcore or whatever that nasty group of moves is called. With team support its a monster, but thats true of many a mon that arent banworthy.
Time will tell.

 

[Magcargo]

It’s on par, if not worse to deal with than BM. It’s very difficult to answer defensively and incredibly tough to break offensively too. Clodsire and toxapex (especially to apex) aren’t good right now, and clef is better off running magic guard.

Eh, disagree on Pex. The fact that it got top tier partners in Gliscor and Volcarona makes it much easier to justify running on Balance. Completely goobing Manaphy and random SP sweepers with Haze + Toxic is valuable utility. Does well vs certain Volcarona variants too, though has the potential to get cheesed by Tera Blast Variants.. Good in infinite switch cycles too thanks to Regen.

 

[Cuddly]

btw does anyone know effective set to use this guy?
I assume its decent Pokemon but best idea I got was Scarf set for Ribombee and revenge killing. Funny since as soon as I dropped it off the team I was using, I immediately encounter Ribombee because of course I would.

 

[Casteliacone]

(only played a few games so take this with a grain of salt) not to be hyperbolic or anything but skeledirge might be the best mon ever made, this fucking thing is FEASTING in regards to how well its movepool additions mesh with the new meta. He just puts in so much work its insane, even stored power cheese mons dont like getting an alluring voice confusion, and it's just a great gluemon in the current unsatble state of the new meta. Give it a try if you haven't, you wont be disappointed. It's enamorus's offensive presence on an unaware wall with recovery, genuinely can't sing its praises enough. Other thoughts include i think deo-d tricked me into using him because it has spikes+teleport, and primarina is quite good rn as well, not sure about it's long term viability atm but it seems to be doing well in the moment

 

[Morkal]

Day 1 of playing the meta.

Terapagos should be banned, entirely. Everyone already talked about it, I don,t care whether its only Stellar form or entirely, this Mon doesn,t bring almost anything positive to OU and has way too many options to sweep entire teams.

Deoxys-S is also pretty cancerous. If all of them were just suicide leads, it would be fine and predictable. But no, it has Screen sets, LO sets and Nasty Plot sets, all while outspeeding the whole meta. It makes HO an even better playstyle than it already is.

Those are the 2 obvious Quick Ban candidates. The next ones would be Blaziken and Gouging Fire, for now their effect to the meta is overshadowed by the above 2, but they will be breaking the meta soon.

Roaring Moon and Gliscor for now look fine, but are also Mons I don,t see any reason to retest in OU, they make the game less fun, even if that by itself is not enough of a reason to ban.

Haven,t seen much Volcaronas, so can,t comment.

Darkrai on the other hand looks fine, especially since it actually is more of a problem versus HO teams than a threat in them. Has common checks and severe 4 slots syndrome.

Serperior is good but not even remotely broken.

Iron Boulder has broken Tier stats... but most of the time can,t get past Dondozo. Also can,t OHKO Gambit with unboosted EQ while Air Balloon is a set. Many weaknesses too.

Speaking about Gambit, when are we suspecting that guy again?

I have lost to Raging Bolt a couple of games but this Mon still looks pretty undewhelming vs anything that is not a hard HO. Slow, not too bulky and somehow with coverage problems. You love to see legendaries with bad coverage these days.

Lastly, even with Stellar Terapagos in the Meta, Sun looks pretty insane unless you take it into account in the builder. Maybe not only Gouging Fire will have to get banned in the future, but also Walking Wake.

I pretty much agree with all of your takes except for Serperior and Gouging Fire; Serperior is the matchup-fishing king and is nuts imo (like Volcarona on steroids). Gouging Fire is great, but it's so inconsistent that I'd hardly call it broken; Blaziken I'm unsure of, but it might become busted over time, I haven't had any issues handling it quite yet (its frailty does hold it back and its speed before a boost almost necessitates a Protect which is super exploitable).

 

[UltiMario]

Idk, I personally like Terapagos's presence in the meta, but I'm in the minority. This shit is strong but it's no bloodmoon, even when Tera'd. I'd say this mon requires Rest to be "broken" but it has a lot of nice value in keeping threats like Dengo in check while not being overly difficult to answer defensively. Pokemon like Spdef Toxapex, Haze Clodsire, and Unaware Clef are easier to justify running rn and I'd say all do fine vs the CM variant. Without Rest, this mon gets Toxic Sralled quite easily.

Idk maybe people are running bad sets rn and stuff like specs are broken, but I think this mon needs more time.


Restalk CM mono Tera Starstorm is my favorite set. Max HP and Def investment.

Echoing this to an extent from my playtesting, Terapagos is surprisingly not as broken as expected. Its definitely more beatable then a lot of other crazy Ubers that have had a shot in the past. I'd even dare say I'd rather deal with this thing than Zam-Crowned but that's potentially a hot take.

It's still overwhelmingly good and will likely be quickbanned. It probly not just from a kneejerk reaction from CM+RP/Spin either, but probably also from the huge versatility it brings. I can't imagine a mon with a movepool this deep and stats this high is "Solved" in Hour 1 metas, and some extra nudges in innovation will probly put it over the edge even if it was kept around for a few weeks.

It's definitely on the lower end of Ubers though. Basically anything else defensive that was ran to check absurd special threats before also beats Terapagos. Multiscale + 160 HP gives you a lot of leeway vs offense though. I've been seeing ChestoRest and Lefties, but idk why when you legit can just go HDB and essentially guarantee two free turns between the Terastal ability and then the stellar's bulk.

It does some have ridiculous utility though. I've been using Spin over Polish because Terapagos just beats so many Pokemon outright, letting it come in as an extremely valuable spinner against Hyper Offense. The small speed drop doesn't matter much- and the chip damage from Rapid Spin can actually come into play at times. Your fourth moveslot is also pretty expendable, letting you randy beat whatever variation of threats your team dislikes the most with the appropriate option. This mon gives you so many options to work with, its crazy.

I will miss being able to build around this mon though. This is basically the Rapid Spinner this gen has direly needed to help stave off hazards stacking, and its gunna get banned because of some optional alt form. It's incredibly tragic.

 

[TheTraininator]

I am going to break Terapagos tiering down into one post and not comment further on the matter because we have a whole new metagame to enjoy and I am not going to waste my time responding to things (especially those said without reading my own prior posts or those said in bad faith).

If Terapagos is banned, it will be banned as a whole Pokemon -- not separated by form or interaction.

Terapagos itself is one Pokemon and no matter how you try to fragment it to cut collateral, you run into major tiering policy issues that either establish new precedent that is undesirable or contradict past precedent.

We do not have any interest in separating things based off of Tera-triggered forms. We did not handle Ogerpon-Hearthflame in that capacity (nor was there any outcry for it then). This point exists regardless of Ogerpon-H's pre-Tera form being broken or not and that is not an applicable counter-argument as it does not address the fact that the point exists regardless of it -- the handling would still be consistent and the same.

Going alongside this, the precedent cited to support fragmenting Terapagos is cited incorrectly on some fronts and inappicable on others. Ubers Mega Rayquaze precedent does not apply to OU as they have a different and more minimalist tiering approach than any usage based tier, which includes OU. Ubers is already a tier based off of a banlist, so they naturally have a diferent set of standards than we do.

Ok, what about Power Construct Zygarde-10%? We banned a signature ability to keep a 700 BST form out of OU. We never ban signature abilities. That’s an OU precedent set right there.

 

[Eeveeto]

I pretty much agree with all of your takes except for Serperior and Gouging Fire; Serperior is the matchup-fishing king and is nuts imo (like Volcarona on steroids). Gouging Fire is great, but it's so inconsistent that I'd hardly call it broken; Blaziken I'm unsure of, but it might become busted over time, I haven't had any issues handling it quite yet (its frailty does hold it back and its speed before a boost almost necessitates a Protect which is super exploitable).

The difference between Serperior and Volcarona is that Serp pretty much requires the Tera, while Volcarona is already strong by the native movepool except vs some specific counters (Heatran, Skeledirge, Dragonite, etc.). Serperior needs to Terastalyze, but often it won,t even be enough to cover everything. Same happens with Volc, but to a far lesser degree, due to the larger native movepool.

 

[Finchinator]

Ok, what about Power Construct Zygarde-10%? We banned a signature ability to keep a 700 BST form out of OU. We never ban signature abilities. That’s an OU precedent set right there.

That was an ability ban of Power Construct as it made multiple forms broken. Not comparable at all.