Tier List Update April 2017

[Munya]

I will announce the Tier list changes of March in this thread.

Due to a late tier update in April causing a shortage in usage data, there will be no usage based tier updates for this month, it will be pushed into May update instead, we apologize for the inconvenience.

 

A list of this months Tier Changes:

 

Moving down from BL to UU:

Kangaskhan:

The Tier council has decided to bring down Kangaskhan for testing from BL to UU.

 

Kangaskhan was banned in December 2016 for the unhealthy characteristic, and since then, the meta has certainly had time to evolve. We have seen a large increase in the popularity of Cradily and Miltank, particularly their curse sets, which can sweep through unprepared teams. Modest Exeggutor has increased in popularity greatly, as it is one of the hardest hitting special attackers in UU currently. Golem has taken the UU meta by storm, rising from the depths of NU to one of the most used pokemon in UU. Many other pokemon have increased in usage that are capable of pressuring Kangaskhan greatly.

 

We are testing Kangaskhan, as we believe pokemon banned for unhealthiness should be tested again once the meta has changed significantly from the original state that the pokemon was banned from. We hope to see a decrease in usage of Scizor, Miltank, and Cradily, as Kangaskhan shares a similar role to Miltank and Cradily, while it also discourages everyone running Scizor as their normal resist, thus incentivizing other normal resists such as Omastar, Armaldo, Steelix, and others. We hope to continue to see the usage of special attackers stay about the same.

 

If Kangaskhan proves to be unhealthy to the tier again, we have no issue re-banning, as the ultimate goal of tiering is to create a balanced meta to play in. Kangaskhan will be tested for a period of time where if it becomes problematic the Tier Council will once again decide its fate. A discussion thread will be opened for the community to provide its own feedback of how the tier is shaping itself after this change.

 

 

Thanks to the Tier Council and everyone who has been participating in Official Tournaments and Matchmaking!