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OU Viability Thread


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Welcome to the OU Viability Thread. If you do not know what a viability thread entails read further. A viability thread has as purpose to put Pokémon into 'ranks', by lack of a better term. In the OU viability rankings we base our rankings on how viable certain Pokémon in OU are. Discussion is encouraged and remember that you are always entitled to your opinion but forget not to be respectful to other community members.

 

There won't be a split between offensive/defensive/support Pokémon as this is a general viability thread. Meaning offensive and defensive Pokémon can fit into the same rank without utilizing the same role. Bringing underrated Pokémon up for discussion is also part of a viability thread discussion. When proposing a ranking change please post reasoning behind your argument to make sure we avoid the thread being littered.

 

 

 

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PokeMMO OU Viability Ranking

(Pokemon listed in alphabetical order)

 

S RankReserved for Pokemon that are the pinnacle of the OU metagame. These Pokemon are able to perform a variety of roles very effectively, or can just do one extremely well. Their use has low risk involved and high reward exerted. Pokemon in this rank have very few flaws that are patched up by numerous positive traits.

 

 

S Rank:

 

Conkeldurr

Hydreigon

Reuniclus

 

 

A RankReserved for Pokemon that are fantastic in the OU metagame, and can sweep, support, or wall significant portions of the metagame. These Pokemon require less support than most others to be used effectively and have few flaws that can easily be compensated for when compared to their positive traits.

 

 

A+ Rank:

 

Chansey

Ferrothorn

Scizor

Tyranitar

Volcarona

 

 

A Rank:

 

Dragonite

Excadrill

Gengar

Hippowdon

Mamoswine

Mienshao

Magnezone

Salamence

Skarmory

 

 

A- Rank:

 

Blissey

Gliscor

Gyarados

Lucario

Kingdra

Milotic

Togekiss

 

 

 

B RankReserved for Pokemon that are great in the OU metagame. These Pokemon have more notable flaws than those above them that affect how they function in the tier. Their positive traits still outshine their negatives, but they require a bit more team support to bring out their full potential.

 

 

B+ Rank:

 

Azumarill

Cloyster

Haxorus

Jellicent

Kabutops

Metagross

Mantine

Pelipper

Starmie

Wobbuffet

 

 

 

B Rank:

 

Breloom

Bronzong

Chandelure

Forretress

Jolteon

Porygon-Z

 

 

 

B- Rank:

 

Arcanine

Darmanitan

Mandibuzz

Roserade

Snorlax

Swampert

Tentacruel
Weezing

 

 

 

 

C RankReserved for Pokemon that are mediocre in the OU metagame, but have just as many notable flaws that prevent them from being effective. Pokemon in the C tier often require significant support to be effective. Pokemon from this rank tend to face a lot of competition with the more commonly used Pokemon. These Pokemon exert a below average presence in the metagame.

 

 

C+ Rank:

 

Alakazam

Clefable

Cofagrigus

Dusknoir

Torkoal

Vaporeon

Weavile

 

 

C Rank:

 

Blaziken

Crobat

Donphan

Hariyama

Heracross

Medicham

Scrafty

Slowbro

 

 

C- Rank:

 

Aerodactyl

Bellossom

Golurk

Houndoom

Krookodile

Flygon

Rhyperior

Sawsbuck

Victreebel

 

 

D RankReserved for Pokemon that are highly mediocre in the OU metagame, but are viable enough to justify their use on select teams. These Pokemon are only capable of doing their specific task and fail at doing anything more than that. Pokemon from this rank have multiple crippling flaws that prevent them from being successful a majority of the time, and are often severely outclassed because of it. These Pokemon exert a poor presence in the metagame.

 

 

D Rank:

 

Shuckle lol

 

Note: Please point out any errors I have not tended to such as spelling errors and what not.

Edited by OrangeManiac
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We had a long discussion with @Blu3Breath and this is our initial feels and reactions from the early metagame. Thanks for Bluebreath for making the initial rankings and write up for these, you da real MVP.

 

This being said, I won't just slap these rankings in the OP. I'd encourage the discussion regarding any given Pokemon. If there's an agreement about a ranking with multiple people I'll start putting these initial ranks.

 

Spoiler

Dugtrio - S Multiple trapping sets, scarf revenges fast pokes, band for power, sub/endure liechi berry ohkos blissey and sash almost guarantees a kill on something.

Cloyster - S/A+ Once setup it is incredibly hard to stop, but suffers from 4mss and choice between sash/orb.

Gengar - A/A- Very scary, can potentially 1v1 anything depending on its vast movepool.

Chansey Non applicable if no eviolite, if their is eviolite then A/A-. It walls anything and everything, very annoying to deal with making special attackers redundant. 

Starmie B+/B Decent spinner but can be trapped by pursuit and easily walled by bliss/chan/ferro.

Gyarados A-/B+ Checks a huge portion of the metagame but has problems coming in on stealth rocks. Has the option to sweep with dragon dance too.

Kabutops B-/C+ Only really ran on rain teams as their physical attacker, it has a niche and performs it well but limited to only rain. (Also 4mss)

Dragonite A A very solid pick, can ohko/2hko a large portion of the metagame with the cb set and extremespeed to deal with some setup pokes. The dragon dance set can win games easily as well.

Azumarill B+/B/B- Hard to place this somewhere, belly drum + aqua jet is amazing but has to deal with dragons. CB set is also nice on rain to get the boost.

Wobbuffet C+/C Really iffy, it doesn't do much and can be played around.

Scizor S/A+ The best uturn user in OU due to stab and excellent priority in bullet punch. Can be very scary with a swords dance set or potentially a support set with roost/defog.

Skarmory B/B+ Ferrothorn generally outclasses it as it finds refuge on offensive teams, skarm has defog/roost/sturdy/flying typing that sets it apart making skarmory generally better on stall.

Kingdra B+/B The best rain sweeper, shut down by bliss/chan/ferro and weather resets. Draco meteor and boosted water moves hit like a truck.

Blissey A-/B+ Has better offensive potential over chansey meaning it can hurt dragons with ice beam and deal with sub dugtrio with hyper voice. Switches in comfortably against the majority of special attackers. 

Tyranitar A/A- Has various sets that are all viable but the weaknesses to ground/fighting/water/grass/steel hurt a lot.

Pelipper B+/B You have to use this on rain, access to uturn makes this amazing to setup the rain then to switch into a sweeper or ferrothorn/scizor. Hits quite hard on its own with the boosted water moves and increased hurricane accuracy. Has problems with stealth rocks meaning it can be killed with some good prediction.

Breloom B/B- Needs technician to shine, poison heal is quite nice for the sub punch set but stall is less viable over offence at the moment. Typically has a hard time if not against stall.

Torkoal C-/D+ No real sun abuser to take advantage of drought, would have to delve into the lower tiers for a sweeper to pair with and even then it would be competing with rain/sand.

Salamence A Intimidate helps this check quite a few mons, has many viable sets (CB/CS/DD/Roost).

Metagross A-/B+ Hits very hard but is a bit slow in this metagame.

Lucario A+/A Very scary to lock yourself into a move when a lucario is around, one wrong move could cost you the game to a SD lucario sweep, however it suffers from 4mss such as bullet or espeed and ice punch or crunch.

Hippowdon A A very solid wall, eats pretty much any physical attack with ease and has a good attack stat and recovery to threaten other mons.

Magnezone A-/B+ Magnet pull alone is amazing to eliminate steel types, mainly ferrothorn and skarmory. Has good buffs over previous gen 3 magneton that doesn't make it rely on magnet pull to pull its weight (flash cannon/volt switch and better bulk/spatk).

Gliscor B- A decent wall with roost but misses poison heal. Can run a double dance set as well to catch someone offguard and sweep.

Mamoswine S/A+ The best lead currently, stealth rocks are very important and mamoswine has two of the best stabs in the game to force switches to get rocks up.

Excadrill A+/A A very good sand sweeper or swords dance sweeper. Has the option to spin as well. 

Conkeldurr S/A+ This thing will most likely live a hit and retaliate with a ohko, very strong pokemon and access to healing from drain punch makes conkeldurr a threat.

Darmanitan B/B- Hits like an absolute truck if played right, but the presence of stealth rock and taking recoil from flare blitzz heavily hinders the wall breaking potential, not to mention OU has many dragon and water types that can take a hit and ohko it.

Archeops D Ability should be fixed and go back to NU.

Reuniclus S/A+ The ability is amazing paired on a pokemon with access to a boosting move (calm mind) and recover makes this destroy hardcore stall teams.

Jellicent A-/B+ Typing is amazing, like you (Orange) said it's the best spin blocker but defog distribution will lower it's viability. Can switch in on many thing and cripple them or beat them 1v1 with recover.

Ferrothorn S/A Hands down the best pokemon we have access to right now, if magnet pull was not a thing it would easily be S rank. Ferrothorn sets up hazards very reliably and can retaliate with gyro ball/power whip to even ohko or 2hko threats. Biggest downside to it is 4mss and no reliable recovery.

Chandelure B/B- Needs support to work well. Can run specs/scarf set well or a sub cm set.

Haxorus A- Has a few nice sets like double dance, dd 3atks, sd 3 atks and cb. Generally outclassed by other dragons because of better stat distribution but haxorus has an insane attack stat, however it needs support from magnezone to really take advantage of it.

Mienshao B+/B A good check (with scarf) to things that have setup like volcarona and salamence, regenerator is an amazing ability letting it not care about hazards. The main problem with meinshao is it can't really switch in, usually you have to sacrifice something to bring it in and often struggles with being choice locked.

Bisharp B-/C+ Defiant is amazing to deal with defog, pursuit is a meh option unless you want to play the 50/50 mind game with starmie. Overall a good sweeper (with sucker punch) if you have good predicts but not having the steel nerf and knock off buff makes life hard for bisharp.

Hydriegon S/A+ Can run multiple different sets, it has no true counter.

Volcarona - A+/A Volcarona is incredibly weak to stealth rocks but that doesn't stop it from being viable. After just one quiver dance it can sweep the majority of the metagame and has a set that can beat any counter. Hp rock deals with flying/fire types, giga for jellicent and resto chesto for blissey.

 

Edited by OrangeManiac
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Lifestyle (rip) raised comments about Skarmory being A territory. Besides the obvious great typing and entry hazards setting capability I really agree about his point that it has excellent longevity with Roost and Taunt is very good against other hazard setters, namely Ferrothorn and Forretress to lesser extent.

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27 minutes ago, OrangeManiac said:

We had a long discussion with @Blu3Breath and this is our initial feels and reactions from the early metagame. Thanks for Bluebreath for making the initial rankings and write up for these, you da real MVP.

 

This being said, I won't just slap these rankings in the OP. I'd encourage the discussion regarding any given Pokemon. If there's an agreement about a ranking with multiple people I'll start putting these initial ranks.

 

  Hide contents

Dugtrio - S Multiple trapping sets, scarf revenges fast pokes, band for power, sub/endure liechi berry ohkos blissey and sash almost guarantees a kill on something.

Cloyster - S/A+ Once setup it is incredibly hard to stop, but suffers from 4mss and choice between sash/orb.

Gengar - A/A- Very scary, can potentially 1v1 anything depending on its vast movepool.

Chansey Non applicable if no eviolite, if their is eviolite then A/A-. It walls anything and everything, very annoying to deal with making special attackers redundant. 

Starmie B+/B Decent spinner but can be trapped by pursuit and easily walled by bliss/chan/ferro.

Gyarados A-/B+ Checks a huge portion of the metagame but has problems coming in on stealth rocks. Has the option to sweep with dragon dance too.

Kabutops B-/C+ Only really ran on rain teams as their physical attacker, it has a niche and performs it well but limited to only rain. (Also 4mss)

Dragonite A A very solid pick, can ohko/2hko a large portion of the metagame with the cb set and extremespeed to deal with some setup pokes. The dragon dance set can win games easily as well.

Azumarill B+/B/B- Hard to place this somewhere, belly drum + aqua jet is amazing but has to deal with dragons. CB set is also nice on rain to get the boost.

Wobbuffet C+/C Really iffy, it doesn't do much and can be played around.

Scizor S/A+ The best uturn user in OU due to stab and excellent priority in bullet punch. Can be very scary with a swords dance set or potentially a support set with roost/defog.

Skarmory B/B+ Ferrothorn generally outclasses it as it finds refuge on offensive teams, skarm has defog/roost/sturdy/flying typing that sets it apart making skarmory generally better on stall.

Kingdra B+/B The best rain sweeper, shut down by bliss/chan/ferro and weather resets. Draco meteor and boosted water moves hit like a truck.

Blissey A-/B+ Has better offensive potential over chansey meaning it can hurt dragons with ice beam and deal with sub dugtrio with hyper voice. Switches in comfortably against the majority of special attackers. 

Tyranitar A/A- Has various sets that are all viable but the weaknesses to ground/fighting/water/grass/steel hurt a lot.

Pelipper B+/B You have to use this on rain, access to uturn makes this amazing to setup the rain then to switch into a sweeper or ferrothorn/scizor. Hits quite hard on its own with the boosted water moves and increased hurricane accuracy. Has problems with stealth rocks meaning it can be killed with some good prediction.

Breloom B/B- Needs technician to shine, poison heal is quite nice for the sub punch set but stall is less viable over offence at the moment. Typically has a hard time if not against stall.

Torkoal C-/D+ No real sun abuser to take advantage of drought, would have to delve into the lower tiers for a sweeper to pair with and even then it would be competing with rain/sand.

Salamence A Intimidate helps this check quite a few mons, has many viable sets (CB/CS/DD/Roost).

Metagross A-/B+ Hits very hard but is a bit slow in this metagame.

Lucario A+/A Very scary to lock yourself into a move when a lucario is around, one wrong move could cost you the game to a SD lucario sweep, however it suffers from 4mss such as bullet or espeed and ice punch or crunch.

Hippowdon A A very solid wall, eats pretty much any physical attack with ease and has a good attack stat and recovery to threaten other mons.

Magnezone A-/B+ Magnet pull alone is amazing to eliminate steel types, mainly ferrothorn and skarmory. Has good buffs over previous gen 3 magneton that doesn't make it rely on magnet pull to pull its weight (flash cannon/volt switch and better bulk/spatk).

Gliscor B- A decent wall with roost but misses poison heal. Can run a double dance set as well to catch someone offguard and sweep.

Mamoswine S/A+ The best lead currently, stealth rocks are very important and mamoswine has two of the best stabs in the game to force switches to get rocks up.

Excadrill A+/A A very good sand sweeper or swords dance sweeper. Has the option to spin as well. 

Conkeldurr S/A+ This thing will most likely live a hit and retaliate with a ohko, very strong pokemon and access to healing from drain punch makes conkeldurr a threat.

Darmanitan B/B- Hits like an absolute truck if played right, but the presence of stealth rock and taking recoil from flare blitzz heavily hinders the wall breaking potential, not to mention OU has many dragon and water types that can take a hit and ohko it.

Archeops D Ability should be fixed and go back to NU.

Reuniclus S/A+ The ability is amazing paired on a pokemon with access to a boosting move (calm mind) and recover makes this destroy hardcore stall teams.

Jellicent A-/B+ Typing is amazing, like you said it's the best spin blocker but defog distribution will lower it's viability. Can switch in on many thing and cripple them or beat them 1v1 with recover.

Ferrothorn S/A Hands down the best pokemon we have access to right now, if magnet pull was not a thing it would easily be S rank. Ferrothorn sets up hazards very reliably and can retaliate with gyro ball/power whip to even ohko or 2hko threats. Biggest downside to it is 4mss and no reliable recovery.

Chandelure B/B- Needs support to work well. Can run specs/scarf set well or a sub cm set.

Haxorus A- Has a few nice sets like double dance, dd 3atks, sd 3 atks and cb. Generally outclassed by other dragons because of better stat distribution but haxorus has an insane attack stat, however it needs support from magnezone to really take advantage of it.

Mienshao B+/B A good check (with scarf) to things that have setup like volcarona and salamence, regenerator is an amazing ability letting it not care about hazards. The main problem with meinshao is it can't really switch in, usually you have to sacrifice something to bring it in and often struggles with being choice locked.

Bisharp B-/C+ Defiant is amazing to deal with defog, pursuit is a meh option unless you want to play the 50/50 mind game with starmie. Overall a good sweeper (with sucker punch) if you have good predicts but not having the steel nerf and knock off buff makes life hard for bisharp.

Hydriegon S/A+ Can run multiple different sets, it has no true counter.

Volcarona - A+/A Volcarona is incredibly weak to stealth rocks but that doesn't stop it from being viable. After just one quiver dance it can sweep the majority of the metagame and has a set that can beat any counter. Hp rock deals with flying/fire types, giga for jellicent and resto chesto for blissey.

 

These are supposed to be used so players have a general idea on what to build around and prepare for. You list Sash on Pokemon like Dugtrio and Cloyster as if it's implemented. Mention Hydreigon having no counters, which would be true if Draco Meteor was in the game, then there's wording on certain things that just leave me thinking ??? Oh, Gyarados has the option to run DD? It's its standard set, Pelipper should be run in the rain? Pelipper IS the rain.

Duggy listed on S. I agree Duggy 's niche is amazing, but right now without Sash it can barely switch into things and if the opponent has priority it has a hard time taking that hit, it can't revenge kill speed set up sweepers unless it runs Scarf and it doesn't pack a big enough punch to break past defensive set up sweepers. Right now however without sash and a proper understanding of how hazard control works (in a weird meta with defog and no magic bouncers) it's far too early to stick it on S.

Cloyster in S. If set up it's scary as hell, you mention its 4MSS as a problem but you also don't list that it's kinda hard to set it up right now, and if your opponent has a hard wall to its set then it's not gonna get a second chance to set up. S rank should be reserved for things that shape up the metagame entirely or that can be put on any team and work just fine (like Conk/Scizor/Reuniclus)

 

Overall I think it's a solid list, but at this point it's pure theorymoning it's far too early to make this thread, there's a ton of stuff not implemented, the patch just came out a day ago so people who are just starting to get used to playing against certain things now have to deal with a whole new barrage of powerful Pokemon and new moves. It's a confusing move to new players to say the least.

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1 minute ago, suigin said:

These are supposed to be used so players have a general idea on what to build around and prepare for. You list Sash on Pokemon like Dugtrio and Cloyster as if it's implemented.

Duggy listed on S. I agree Duggy 's niche is amazing, but right now without Sash it can barely switch into things and if the opponent has priority it has a hard time taking that hit, it can't revenge kill speed set up sweepers unless it runs Scarf and it doesn't pack a big enough punch to break past defensive set up sweepers. Right now however without sash and a proper understanding of how hazard control works (in a weird meta with defog and no magic bouncers) it's far too early to stick it on S.

Well, as stated in the OP we are in a metagame filled with things that don't exist/aren't working but if we know the implementation of something make something notably better it's probably wise to already talk about. The fact Dugtrio is already really good is one thing but the fact it's about to have Sash would make it pretty stupid to act like it isn't one of the first Pokemon you should take a look at whether these should exist in the metagame. Listing it anything but S gives a completely wrong image about what's coming.

 

1 minute ago, suigin said:

Mention Hydreigon having no counters, which would be true if Draco Meteor was in the game, then there's wording on certain things that just leave me thinking ???

Can you mention one definitive counter to Hydreigon? It barely even has checks.

 

1 minute ago, suigin said:

Oh, Gyarados has the option to run DD? It's its standard set, Pelipper should be run in the rain? Pelipper IS the rain.

The Pelipper part is just miswording obviously but don't get too caught up on the Gyara part. Sure, most people would put DD on it and make it a threatening sweeper but it has other potential as well such as being a physical defensive check to basically anything, spreading Twave, endless coverage, you name it.

 

1 minute ago, suigin said:

Cloyster in S. If set up it's scary as hell, you mention its 4MSS as a problem but you also don't list that it's kinda hard to set it up right now, and if your opponent has a hard wall to its set then it's not gonna get a second chance to set up. S rank should be reserved for things that shape up the metagame entirely or that can be put on any team and work just fine (like Conk/Scizor/Reuniclus)

I personally think Cloyster is A+ good and has chance to be in the S territory. Even though it could turn into a ridiculous sweeping machine at any given point, it isn't exactly so one dimensional. In a tier lacking physical switch-ins, it isn't that if Cloyster doesn't have a legitimate chance to set up, it's useless. Quite contrary, it can be quite a nice physical check and can beat lots of walls with 5 attack Skill Link even without Shell Smash. This all aside, I feel like if played correctly it should be able to set up in most matches and quite rarely it gets less than one kill. Just the potential to turn any game around at any point is crazy. Now, if we're to talk about future meta - team preview does kinda keep Cloyster enough in check to hinder the sweeping element but at this point I'm honestly scared about it a lot. Putting S I guess would be stupid at this point but anything under A is underselling it hard. Because it could potentially be S territory we ranked is S/A+ for now.

 

1 minute ago, suigin said:

Overall I think it's a solid list, but at this point it's pure theorymoning it's far too early to make this thread, there's a ton of stuff not implemented, the patch just came out a day ago so people who are just starting to get used to playing against certain things now have to deal with a whole new barrage of powerful Pokemon and new moves. It's a confusing move to new players to say the least.

I don't really understand this right now, you're already allowing people to suggest Pokemon to be discussed in OU Tier Discussion thread but it's too early for OU Viability thread? Usually Tier Discussions begin after something is deemed by multiple players potentially suspect worthy in a viability thread. If anything, it's much less confusing to first agree about the rankings of some Pokemon compared to having everybody voice out the Pokemon they deem too overpowered in the tier OU discussion thread and potentially there's like 5-6 different Pokemon people consider possible Ubers. If there's a viability thread, people could much more easily change their opinion of what they would previously decide broken and actually try to come up with ways to counterplay something. I could understand your point if OU Tier Discussion thread wasn't opened but if anything, this one should be much before any bans ever could be suggested.

 

Now this all being said, I'm aware staff and Tier Council does consist of individuals and it probably is that you don't think the aforementioned OU Tier Discussion thread should have been opened. But I would honestly see quite rather you arguing that being a thing rather than this thread.

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The list was made assuming things would be working like sash and abilities. I didn't delve deep into descriptions just the first things that came to mind when writing a brief summary of why I believe it should warrant that rank, pardon me for being a bit lazy I just wanted to have a little something for each mon.

Anything that was in S was iffy at best, there were many /s for a reason. I felt I gave it out too often but wanted to leave a list that could help someone make their own decisions seeing as a viability thread would be mostly subjective until someone gives a solid reason as to why something should place at x rank. I don't think it would be wrong to have an initial list for people to build upon, even if some reasoning may be flawed.

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28 minutes ago, OrangeManiac said:

 The fact Dugtrio is already really good is one thing but the fact it's about to have Sash would make it pretty stupid to act like it isn't one of the first Pokemon you should take a look at whether these should exist in the metagame. Listing it anything but S gives a completely wrong image about what's coming.

I'd argue that Dugtrio is not amazing right now. There's a lot of ifs on whether it can trap and kill things right now, look at the OU tier. On a great day it can trap more or less around 18 Pokemon, That great day includes, being switched in safely, that Pokemon not being under any sort of boost,  and maybe having the right tools to deal with said Pokemon. However on a bad day, you cannot risk switching in directly, it cannot trap and kill weather boosters so -3 mons to that list Speed boosters and Scarf users require you to have a scarf of your own which means you miss out on KOs to other things and even then you may not be able to RK in some cases (Cloyster, Haxorus), you have huge 4MSS so you may be able to beat certain things but become dead weight against others, you may end up being set up bait for stuff like Mence after killing something. It's good if you need a "I specifically want to remove this particular thing" but outside of that it feels mediocre specially without sash, I could be wrong but so far my personal experiences and looking at the tier list it just feels meh.

Using future implementations is confusing to say the least, this patch took almost a month to come out. Who knows when the next one will come out? Should we include Xatu in B+ Rank because the Hidden Abilities patch will come out in the future? Garchomp to S? Of course this is exaggerating but we barely have data on the metagame that started out yesterday so we shouldn't assume how things will look on a future patch.

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Can you mention one definitive counter to Hydreigon? It barely even has checks.

Touche, it just has more checks, my mistake.

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Sure, most people would put DD on it and make it a threatening sweeper but it has other potential as well such as being a physical defensive check to basically anything, spreading Twave, endless coverage, you name it.

Thunder Wave spreading should be going the way of the Dodo, it's just not good anymore, Gunthug took it behind the barn and shot it in the back of its head. But anyways that's a niche set I'm sure if I had access to the usage % of Gyarados sets Dragon Dance would be on around 95% of them.

 

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I personally think Cloyster is A+ good and has chance to be in the S territory. Even though it could turn into a ridiculous sweeping machine at any given point, it isn't exactly so one dimensional. In a tier lacking physical switch-ins, it isn't that if Cloyster doesn't have a legitimate chance to set up, it's useless. Quite contrary, it can be quite a nice physical check and can beat lots of walls with 5 attack Skill Link even without Shell Smash. This all aside, I feel like if played correctly it should be able to set up in most matches and quite rarely it gets less than one kill. Just the potential to turn any game around at any point is crazy. Now, if we're to talk about future meta - team preview does kinda keep Cloyster enough in check to hinder the sweeping element but at this point I'm honestly scared about it a lot. Putting S I guess would be stupid at this point but anything under A is underselling it hard. Because it could potentially be S territory we ranked is S/A+ for now.

On paper Cloyster is really really good, in action however it can't really set up on that many things, if it's a special attacker then you're very likely not going to want to set up on it, Its physical bulk is impressive until you realize that it's uninvested so you take a good amount of damage from strong physical attackers, Physical walls that may not damage you much like Hippowdon or Skarmory can just phaze you away. Your weakness to Rocks also reduces your chances of sweeping for too long and safely setting up. It is good when set up, absolutely, however it requires quite a bit of support and good momentum in order to successfully set up, on top of that it still has the 4mss problem, and can be revenge killed by some priority,

You mention it can hit pretty hard without setting up however if your opponent switches a hard check to it on that turn, then you're less likely to be able to set up a later turn due to the damage you may have taken by the incoming attack you switched it into, and maybe hazard damage. And I don't want to start with its vulnerability to status.

Due to all these reasons I think it shouldn't be S rank and maybe not even A+ rank. It's still too early to say.

 

 

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I don't really understand this right now, you're already allowing people to suggest Pokemon to be discussed in OU Tier Discussion thread but it's too early for OU Viability thread? Usually Tier Discussions begin after something is deemed by multiple players potentially suspect worthy in a viability thread. If anything, it's much less confusing to first agree about the rankings of some Pokemon compared to having everybody voice out the Pokemon they deem too overpowered in the tier OU discussion thread and potentially there's like 5-6 different Pokemon people consider possible Ubers. If there's a viability thread, people could much more easily change their opinion of what they would previously decide broken and actually try to come up with ways to counterplay something. I could understand your point if OU Tier Discussion thread wasn't opened but if anything, this one should be much before any bans ever could be suggested.

The tier discussions were added to discuss the game in general and maybe nominate something for a ban if that thing was clearly too strong(I was afraid of Wobb but it ended up being pretty mediocre) , it was essentially protocol. Thankfully nothing was too strong and the only nominations we got were Skill Link Mamoswine and Volcarona by a person who until recently thought Stealth Rock was for nabs.

 

Viability rankings however are there to guide people into the tiers, not solely discuss them and right now there's not a stable enough metagame to rank things, specially since we're including things from future implementantions for some reason. It may do more harm than good to an unexperienced player who could blindly make a Dugtrio because it's S tier and then not quite understand how to use it.

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@suigin


Fair enough for pretty much all of that. I guess we could avoid ranking things like Dugtrio for now to not mislead people for one way or another. What comes to Hidden Abilities, well I don't exactly know how to approach those as we don't even know what Pokemon will get Hidden Ability. Meanwhile we can assume mechanics are going to work as they're supposed to. But regardless it's probably smart to refrain from ranking things that aren't fully working for now.

 

Nvm, I misunderstood that Skill Link Mamoswine sentence, I didn't realize the post you initially referred to.

Edited by OrangeManiac
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1 minute ago, SluaghMMO said:

Oh hi.

 

Just a question. Will these ranks ever change if they decide to add "team preview"?

 

If so, why? Could you please give me some exemples? Thanks. :)

To some extent, yeah. Some set up sweepers are more threatening without Team Preview than they would be with Team Preview. However, I'd say the ranks could change only by a semi-rank in most cases as the chance for potential sweep will still change the playstyle of the player trying to avoid the sweep of this scary sweeper. That particular Pokemon probably has a bit lesser effect in the battle as it might seem without Team Preview, but those Pokemon won't inherently get that much worse even with it.

 

I don't think anything A becomes B or B comes C when we have team preview but small changes obviously are possible.

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Let's start from the top down and hammer out our S mons first:

 

100% agree Dugtrio is at the top. With incredible speed, resistance to stealth rocks, lack of pursuit users that resist eq, and as increased attack stat from the last time we saw it... easy S.

 

Ferrothorn. With iron barbs working now it's just a behemoth. Gyro Ball is flat out stronk. And having the diversity to set up all the hazards is great. 

 

Tyranitar. Has all its tricks and can do so much. Trap, set up hazards or set up itself, swing away with great coverage, or RK.

 

Outside of that, no S mons come to mind right now. Keep an eye on excadrill with sand rush working. 5 turn sand might be the trick to keep it from ubers. 

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6 minutes ago, Mnemosyne said:

Isnt A rank a bit too much for Tyranitar.

 

5 minutes ago, DoubleJ said:

Tyranitar. Has all its tricks and can do so much. Trap, set up hazards or set up itself, swing away with great coverage, or RK.

Pretty much my answer to this. There are so many reasons to run Tyranitar. Wallbreaker, special defensive pivot, rock setter, amazing stats. Good old Dino has it all. So many reasons to use it. It doesn't exactly shine but it's an answer to everything.

 

Also about Ferrothorn being S, I don't really disagree. I mean, it's just so good. It might seem as a weird choice of "S" as its role is mainly to support its team but oh boi does it do it well. Like, you couldn't possible ask for better support than Iron Barbs, that typing, entry hazards. And the attack prevents from switching into. I'd gladly hear more input about this but I'm not definitely against considering Ferrothorn to be the very pinnacle of the metagame.

 

Edit: The obvious flaw for Ferrothorn is Magnezone trap but Shed Shell doesn't exactly limit Ferrothorn from being as amazing.

Edited by OrangeManiac
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252+ Atk Choice Band Skarmory Pursuit vs. 0 HP / 4 Def Dugtrio: 92-109 (87.6 - 103.8%) -- 25% chance to OHKO
Ez af.
On a more serious note: The problem with cloyster set ups is rocks. Cloyster only have some set up baits. Well, with possible sandstorm damage, and the 230% rocks on the field, chances are cloyster wont be able to set up more than once (Even less with life orb) Also, a lot of priority moves hurt him a lot (Looks at mach punch, while vacum wave outright murders it). At the end of the day, it can sweep unprepared teams, but I doubt we will see cloyster sweeps like that. Its great, but not that great.
Lastly, Don´t underestimate wobbuffet like that, please. You would be surprised how much one can abuse with it.
 
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1 minute ago, pachima said:
252+ Atk Choice Band Skarmory Pursuit vs. 0 HP / 4 Def Dugtrio: 92-109 (87.6 - 103.8%) -- 25% chance to OHKO
Ez af.
On a more serious note: The problem with cloyster set ups is rocks. Cloyster only have some set up baits. Well, with possible sandstorm damage, and the 230% rocks on the field, chances are cloyster wont be able to set up more than once (Even less with life orb) Also, a lot of priority moves hurt him a lot (Looks at mach punch, while vacum wave outright murders it). At the end of the day, it can sweep unprepared teams, but I doubt we will see cloyster sweeps like that. Its great, but not that great.
Lastly, Don´t underestimate wobbuffet like that, please. You would be surprised how much one can abuse with it.
 

I've tried Cloyster in past two days and it has felt rather ridiculously good so far. I guess if (when) I bring it to officials I can see how the better players can counterplay against it and I might change my opinion. By the way, don't ever bring Cloyster without Defogger. 

 

I might underestimate a Wobbu a little bit but it's such a difficult Pokemon to rank. It has a high risk high reward factor to it: In some games it can be the biggest annoyance ever and in some games it might be a set up bait. Those mons are really difficult to rank. I don't really have any definitive opinion where to rank it. I just don't know how I would rank it.

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28 minutes ago, suigin said:

I'd argue that Dugtrio is not amazing right now. There's a lot of ifs on whether it can trap and kill things right now, look at the OU tier.

I disagree, been testing him out a lot lately, mostly a sucker punch reversal one, and it works like a charm. I agree with Orange here.


Question to the thread, dunno how ridiculous this might sound, but how about Kings Rock Cloyster for the flinch chance with skill link? Didn't confirm how if the proc would be a chance per hit like criticals or not, but I'm guessing it is.

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4 minutes ago, OrangeManiac said:

I've tried Cloyster in past two days and it has felt rather ridiculously good so far. I guess if (when) I bring it to officials I can see how the better players can counterplay against it and I might change my opinion. By the way, don't ever bring Cloyster without Defogger. 

 

I might underestimate a Wobbu a little bit but it's such a difficult Pokemon to rank. It has a high risk high reward factor to it: In some games it can be the biggest annoyance ever and in some games it might be a set up bait. Those mons are really difficult to rank. I don't really have any definitive opinion where to rank it. I just don't know how I would rank it.

Carry defog + scarf or specs magnezone and do work. Ice Shard to protect against Mach Punch RK. 

 

Jellicent is the best counter, along with Gyro Ball Forr. Special mention to Skarm to phaze it out. Can also carry Vap if you're really desperate (wish + scald is good in general so it's not worthless). 

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7 minutes ago, redspawn said:

 

 

I disagree, been testing him out a lot lately, mostly a sucker punch reversal one, and it works like a charm. I agree with Orange here.


Question to the thread, dunno how ridiculous this might sound, but how about Kings Rock Cloyster for the flinch chance with skill link? Didn't confirm how if the proc would be a chance per hit like criticals or not, but I'm guessing it is.

it is (or should be) and it was used on showdown some years ago. All depends if you dont mind the lack of a better item, which is for some reason called "better" 

Nevertheless, its an option.

EDIT: Lmao, forgot king´s rock is banned, lame af.

 

 

Edited by pachima
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4 minutes ago, redspawn said:

 

 

I disagree, been testing him out a lot lately, mostly a sucker punch reversal one, and it works like a charm. I agree with Orange here.


Question to the thread, dunno how ridiculous this might sound, but how about Kings Rock Cloyster for the flinch chance with skill link? Didn't confirm how if the proc would be a chance per hit like criticals or not, but I'm guessing it is.

Kings Rock is banned.

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My main issue with the current viability list is not that it isn't good, but that it doesn't make sense since it only takes in consideration the pokemons in the OU pokedex. I don't think Torkoal deserves the D rank, but stuff in lower tiers like Milotic or Mandibuzz could certainly be useful in OU despite not being OU mons right now.

 

Cloyster also has hard counters in lower tiers. If Cloyster was so devastating in OU, I would expect to see Poliwarth and other mons listed at the bottom of the OU viability ranking because even thought these mons are pretty bad, they would still be pretty valuable against one the best pokemon of the tier. It's like putting Ttar as S rank in gen 3 while not listing Hitmontop as at least D rank, it would not be coherent.

Edited by gbwead
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1 minute ago, redspawn said:

Mostly to kill curiosity, but why is it? 

It's kind of remains from the past. In the early 2013 when the early clauses were made, some moderator thought Hax Items are unfair. Then they got banned from the early tournaments and then we just got along with it while no one exactly wanted to revert that decision because "m-m-muh competitiveness". This being said, I'm not exactly in favor of allowing them either because it kind of turns the game into dice roll rather than strategy game. Someone could say that's what Pokemon is from the very nature of it and they aren't wrong but let's at least keep the illusion this is a competitive game.

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5 minutes ago, gbwead said:

My main issue with the current viability list is not that it isn't good, but that it doesn't make sense since it only takes in consideration the pokemons in the OU pokedex. I don't think Torkoal deserves the D rank, but stuff in lower tiers like Milotic or Mandibuzz could certainly be useful in OU despite not being OU mons right now.

 

Cloyster also has hard counters in lower tiers. If Cloyster was so devastating in OU, I would expect to see Poliwarth and other mons listed at the bottom of the OU viability ranking because even thought these mons are pretty bad, they are would still be pretty valuable against one the best pokemon of the tier. 

About Cloyster, I highly agree. I guess for it to really be S people should start running very obscure mons to counter it (such as Regenerator-less Slowbro, Poliwrath or something like that). Oddly enough it performs really well against the projected OUs so that's kind of hard Pokemon to approach.

 

By the way, if there's lower tier mons to nominate then feel free. I think the aforementioned Milotic and Mandibuzz could possibly be even B rank due to fulfilling some roles specifically well.

 

Double by the way, guys don't take Bluebreath's post too seriously, is just a conversation starter. I'm not going to include any ranks in this guide before a sufficient amount of people have agreed on a rank.

 

Edited by OrangeManiac
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