You need to chill tf out. Garg is not difficult to deal with anymore. This isn't month 1 of SV OU, we have pokemon that accomplish tasks now
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Metagame SV OU Metagame Discussion v4 [Volcarona Banned]
- Thread starter TPP
- Start date
Regarding the sleep ban
I implore the council to consider each move on a case by case basis. Going over the main primary methods that cause direct sleep, counterplay, and my opinion on these topics and similar topics.
Sleep Powder
Causes sleep but has the drawback of not being very accurate with 75% accuracy. This results in games being won with it more often than not. Due to being a powder move, Safety glasses is a strong method to ignore this move's existence, while also being a strong item to ignore sandstorm that your team might be providing. Berries are an alternative, Rest Sleep talk sets also don’t mind being put to sleep by Sleep Powder. Grass types also are immune to this method of putting a target to sleep. Heal Bell and Aromatherapy also exist to benefit this.Natural Cure is another ability that exists in the metagame that disregards what sleep could do. Early Bird exists but isn’t as prominent and I wouldn’t expect formal OU players to be running a Pokemon just for Early Bird. I do think Tapu Fini’s Misty terrain or Tapu Koko’s Electric Terrain was a more prominent faster way to get out of sleep issues entirely before they take place, but that case will be ignored because Tapu Fini isn’t in Gen 9 OU. These aren’t specific cases, items like Lum berry, or Safety Goggles are multi purpose items in many instances of the metagame. Heal Bell or Aromatherapy also are general cases that are helpful for any status.
Spore
All instances I’ve listed above with Sleep Powder also exist with Spore.
Same as sleep powder but less splashable as fewer Pokemon have access to this move, primary targets being Breloom, Ammongus, and Smeargle(more so in ubers or AG).
Yawn case
Yawn unlike these other moves adds to the metagame it rewards a more passive style of play, and punishes setup offensive styles of play. Yes, it's another splashable sleep move, but due to the sleep clause existing prior to this rule change limiting a team to only having 1 target asleep this move was never overpowered. In most circumstances this move wouldn’t be overpowered in either event it only adds to the metagame with prediction. Often used in draft, but may be banned in some future drafts because many known draft leagues that are focused around OU use the base clause rules as a template while building their document. It also allows it to do completely nothing if the user just switches. All it does is change the game state in the vast majority of instances, which isn’t unbalanced. Or does it seem that people think that slowing down this power crept meta game with yawn is a bad idea. The benefits of having support sleep options that have counterplay in the OU metagame far outweigh the cons of the rng turn counter, because these 3 moves have viable strong counterplay.
Let’s Talk about Sleep
Regarding the cases above I’ve listed none of the current metagame targets are able to effectively take advantage of these moves to automatically win the majority of games easily with the exception of H-Lilligant which wasn’t even an excessive threat even with Sleep Powder, but on top of the counterplay to its method of sleep. As for Sun teams that use H-Lilligant again, Sleep Powder has a lot of counterplay.
As a mechanic, sleep is usually RNG unless you put yourself to sleep with rest then it is static 2 turns. While sometimes we can agree sleep is manageable other times it isn’t. Games could be won or lost on bad RNG with how many turns a Pokemon stays asleep. This mechanic is similar to terrestrialization in this manner, or confusion. Both Confusion and Terrastalization as mechanics can automatically win games that the player may not have won otherwise. RNG does exist in Pokemon but mechanics that the player can relatively avoid with team building and planning can be dealt with.
Confusion has a chance to hurt the user in confusion potentially multiple times in 1 confusion instance. Which in itself can take away multiple turns and be more harmful then sleep. While having the same primary counterplay as yawn, via switching.
Terrestrialization as a mechanic is RNG based, sure to some extent you can predict within reason what type they might be, but on occasion you will face a type you didn’t expect that wins the game alone. A type change that follows smogons recommended sets while common, there are teams that deviate from those quite often. This mechanic alone this generation has caused multiple Pokemon to be banned prior to the DLC, and will likely continue to ban Pokemon as this generation moves forward. While no action is being taken on it. Regarding the sleep ban and NOT banning tera, I’d say the council has banned the lesser of 2 evils.
Hypnosis:
Hypnosis is a move that had its biggest rise in generation 7 which was with Z-Hypnosis particularly with Ultra Beasts, but with how prominent Tapus was in that given generation it wasn’t really an issue and was manageable.
This move has always had less options to handle but in exchange less accuracy.
Lower accuracy then sleep powder at 60%, so you might as well flip coins and you’ll often win more then you lose, but only 10% more. The threats that utilized this Iron Val and Darkrai specifically are just examples of power creep. While the answers for this may be less than Sleep Powder, and unconventional, the move isn’t the most consistent. I’m unsure why other moves need to be banned because of the lack of counterplay this generation to fast power crept hypnosis abusers. The examples given by the council have been primarily targeting this move, and singles out the fact there is little counterplay to fast abusers of it. With how RNG based Sleep is as a mechanic. However between generation 9 OU and Nat dex for the same generation, there is no reason why this format (in a competitive sense would be banned on one and not the other, except Tapus, but if Tapus are in fact the only reason that is restricted to team building). Overall in generation 9 I see this as the main move that is causing this entire issue, but I also have an idea that might make this not matter as much as it currently does.
Regarding the argument of being ‘console accurate’ or enforceable on the console, not clicking a sleep move can be done. Before recently the timers were 20 minutes so any single battles that take place on console aren’t going to PP stalling. Even in generation 7 or 6 with 1 hour battle timers PP stalling would rarely take games by themselves. As we are referring to the switch battle timer/delay and animation mechanics prior to the dlc you were given very little time to ever attempt to run out of PP (even if you just used 1-3 Pokemon in a 1v1 or 3v3 trying to waste pp fast while sitting threw the animations/delay). Up until recently that would be the case, but with friendly battles 60 minute timer now being implemented PP stalling goes back to how it was in generation 7 and prior. However on showdown neither timer is ever enforced on the traditional ladder, why? It’s a simulator, and as such if it wanted to accurately represent what would happen in such conditions would a timer not be required on ladder tiering? or simply the council chooses not to add it because letting players resolve a battle is simply more fun/healthier for the game to let players finish what they might have not been able to otherwise? Furthermore animation/delay is further reduced/near eliminated on showdown so if a timer was ever added to traditional battling, accurately accounting for the delay/animations reflected only on the timer (for the convenience of the playerbase) might also be required in this instance. One of the main points I’m making about this is, the degree in which battles are done on showdown is ‘console accurate’ is less than the player base may think because prior to the friendly battle timers and the entire generation 8, a large quantity of battles on showdown(that weren’t aborted) wouldn’t finish on console with a clear winner and would usually go to HP deciding it, at least until a timer and delay are added to ladder battle.
Sleep clause, while not directly enforceable on console, has been more or less a gentleman’s agreement, and should continue to be. To benefit everything from draft formats to actual OU, Yawn utility in some bulky lower tier options is helpful while having active counterplay. Sleep Powder and Spore have a lot of counterplay as well. I’m aware I didn’t go over Sing and options of that nature, I could but they usually aren’t viable enough, however if anyone wants to hear my opinion regarding them I could.
In conclusion, sleep while may be rng based can be healthy to OU and other formats, while some may be unhealthier than others (Hypnosis), most of. My suggestions to fix some issues with the sleep clause, would be banning terra(this removes a lot of threats that might be causing these issues due to how the meta changes). Banning tera shifts turns the OU format on its head, simply because a lot of Pokemon that are broken with tera wouldn’t be, and a lot of Pokemon that are going to be bounced on and off the smogon banlist wouldn’t need to be. I could see Iron Valiant still being a big sleep abuser, which would be more manageable under sleep clause in a format where it can’t tera. Iron Valiant and Darkrai would almost never be on the same team because of the sleep clause (doesn’t mean they can’t be used on the same, it would just waste a slot in many circumstances unless you're not running sleep on 1 or both of these). Without having both the ability to tera your opponent can’t safely sleep, setup and tera accordingly. Sleep isn’t the issue, the ability to tera is the issue.
I implore the council to consider each move on a case by case basis. Going over the main primary methods that cause direct sleep, counterplay, and my opinion on these topics and similar topics.
Sleep Powder
Causes sleep but has the drawback of not being very accurate with 75% accuracy. This results in games being won with it more often than not. Due to being a powder move, Safety glasses is a strong method to ignore this move's existence, while also being a strong item to ignore sandstorm that your team might be providing. Berries are an alternative, Rest Sleep talk sets also don’t mind being put to sleep by Sleep Powder. Grass types also are immune to this method of putting a target to sleep. Heal Bell and Aromatherapy also exist to benefit this.Natural Cure is another ability that exists in the metagame that disregards what sleep could do. Early Bird exists but isn’t as prominent and I wouldn’t expect formal OU players to be running a Pokemon just for Early Bird. I do think Tapu Fini’s Misty terrain or Tapu Koko’s Electric Terrain was a more prominent faster way to get out of sleep issues entirely before they take place, but that case will be ignored because Tapu Fini isn’t in Gen 9 OU. These aren’t specific cases, items like Lum berry, or Safety Goggles are multi purpose items in many instances of the metagame. Heal Bell or Aromatherapy also are general cases that are helpful for any status.
Spore
All instances I’ve listed above with Sleep Powder also exist with Spore.
Same as sleep powder but less splashable as fewer Pokemon have access to this move, primary targets being Breloom, Ammongus, and Smeargle(more so in ubers or AG).
Yawn case
Yawn unlike these other moves adds to the metagame it rewards a more passive style of play, and punishes setup offensive styles of play. Yes, it's another splashable sleep move, but due to the sleep clause existing prior to this rule change limiting a team to only having 1 target asleep this move was never overpowered. In most circumstances this move wouldn’t be overpowered in either event it only adds to the metagame with prediction. Often used in draft, but may be banned in some future drafts because many known draft leagues that are focused around OU use the base clause rules as a template while building their document. It also allows it to do completely nothing if the user just switches. All it does is change the game state in the vast majority of instances, which isn’t unbalanced. Or does it seem that people think that slowing down this power crept meta game with yawn is a bad idea. The benefits of having support sleep options that have counterplay in the OU metagame far outweigh the cons of the rng turn counter, because these 3 moves have viable strong counterplay.
Let’s Talk about Sleep
Regarding the cases above I’ve listed none of the current metagame targets are able to effectively take advantage of these moves to automatically win the majority of games easily with the exception of H-Lilligant which wasn’t even an excessive threat even with Sleep Powder, but on top of the counterplay to its method of sleep. As for Sun teams that use H-Lilligant again, Sleep Powder has a lot of counterplay.
As a mechanic, sleep is usually RNG unless you put yourself to sleep with rest then it is static 2 turns. While sometimes we can agree sleep is manageable other times it isn’t. Games could be won or lost on bad RNG with how many turns a Pokemon stays asleep. This mechanic is similar to terrestrialization in this manner, or confusion. Both Confusion and Terrastalization as mechanics can automatically win games that the player may not have won otherwise. RNG does exist in Pokemon but mechanics that the player can relatively avoid with team building and planning can be dealt with.
Confusion has a chance to hurt the user in confusion potentially multiple times in 1 confusion instance. Which in itself can take away multiple turns and be more harmful then sleep. While having the same primary counterplay as yawn, via switching.
Terrestrialization as a mechanic is RNG based, sure to some extent you can predict within reason what type they might be, but on occasion you will face a type you didn’t expect that wins the game alone. A type change that follows smogons recommended sets while common, there are teams that deviate from those quite often. This mechanic alone this generation has caused multiple Pokemon to be banned prior to the DLC, and will likely continue to ban Pokemon as this generation moves forward. While no action is being taken on it. Regarding the sleep ban and NOT banning tera, I’d say the council has banned the lesser of 2 evils.
Hypnosis:
Hypnosis is a move that had its biggest rise in generation 7 which was with Z-Hypnosis particularly with Ultra Beasts, but with how prominent Tapus was in that given generation it wasn’t really an issue and was manageable.
This move has always had less options to handle but in exchange less accuracy.
Lower accuracy then sleep powder at 60%, so you might as well flip coins and you’ll often win more then you lose, but only 10% more. The threats that utilized this Iron Val and Darkrai specifically are just examples of power creep. While the answers for this may be less than Sleep Powder, and unconventional, the move isn’t the most consistent. I’m unsure why other moves need to be banned because of the lack of counterplay this generation to fast power crept hypnosis abusers. The examples given by the council have been primarily targeting this move, and singles out the fact there is little counterplay to fast abusers of it. With how RNG based Sleep is as a mechanic. However between generation 9 OU and Nat dex for the same generation, there is no reason why this format (in a competitive sense would be banned on one and not the other, except Tapus, but if Tapus are in fact the only reason that is restricted to team building). Overall in generation 9 I see this as the main move that is causing this entire issue, but I also have an idea that might make this not matter as much as it currently does.
Regarding the argument of being ‘console accurate’ or enforceable on the console, not clicking a sleep move can be done. Before recently the timers were 20 minutes so any single battles that take place on console aren’t going to PP stalling. Even in generation 7 or 6 with 1 hour battle timers PP stalling would rarely take games by themselves. As we are referring to the switch battle timer/delay and animation mechanics prior to the dlc you were given very little time to ever attempt to run out of PP (even if you just used 1-3 Pokemon in a 1v1 or 3v3 trying to waste pp fast while sitting threw the animations/delay). Up until recently that would be the case, but with friendly battles 60 minute timer now being implemented PP stalling goes back to how it was in generation 7 and prior. However on showdown neither timer is ever enforced on the traditional ladder, why? It’s a simulator, and as such if it wanted to accurately represent what would happen in such conditions would a timer not be required on ladder tiering? or simply the council chooses not to add it because letting players resolve a battle is simply more fun/healthier for the game to let players finish what they might have not been able to otherwise? Furthermore animation/delay is further reduced/near eliminated on showdown so if a timer was ever added to traditional battling, accurately accounting for the delay/animations reflected only on the timer (for the convenience of the playerbase) might also be required in this instance. One of the main points I’m making about this is, the degree in which battles are done on showdown is ‘console accurate’ is less than the player base may think because prior to the friendly battle timers and the entire generation 8, a large quantity of battles on showdown(that weren’t aborted) wouldn’t finish on console with a clear winner and would usually go to HP deciding it, at least until a timer and delay are added to ladder battle.
Sleep clause, while not directly enforceable on console, has been more or less a gentleman’s agreement, and should continue to be. To benefit everything from draft formats to actual OU, Yawn utility in some bulky lower tier options is helpful while having active counterplay. Sleep Powder and Spore have a lot of counterplay as well. I’m aware I didn’t go over Sing and options of that nature, I could but they usually aren’t viable enough, however if anyone wants to hear my opinion regarding them I could.
In conclusion, sleep while may be rng based can be healthy to OU and other formats, while some may be unhealthier than others (Hypnosis), most of. My suggestions to fix some issues with the sleep clause, would be banning terra(this removes a lot of threats that might be causing these issues due to how the meta changes). Banning tera shifts turns the OU format on its head, simply because a lot of Pokemon that are broken with tera wouldn’t be, and a lot of Pokemon that are going to be bounced on and off the smogon banlist wouldn’t need to be. I could see Iron Valiant still being a big sleep abuser, which would be more manageable under sleep clause in a format where it can’t tera. Iron Valiant and Darkrai would almost never be on the same team because of the sleep clause (doesn’t mean they can’t be used on the same, it would just waste a slot in many circumstances unless you're not running sleep on 1 or both of these). Without having both the ability to tera your opponent can’t safely sleep, setup and tera accordingly. Sleep isn’t the issue, the ability to tera is the issue.
It's probably gonna get suspected after. It might not go; as of now, a lot of the general consensus isn't that high, despite qualified being very high. I honestly think it should probably get banned; with SD it just dumpsters so much, and it has a fantastic typing offensively and defensively to back it up. Its counterplay really extends to grass types, which there are basically very few good defensive grass types defensively with ferro gone, and even though meow/rilla/serp can all come in, eat a hit and threaten it out, its still quite dangerous and if these mons are chipped it becomes much less likely. Dnite is also okay because it isn't always running play rough.
I also think after it gets banned (if), cornerstone will probably replace it; i don't know if it'll be broken, but I think grass rock offensive coverage is still insane, and on paper its better offensively then wellspring. A built in focus sash helps it too, although its issue is that its a much worse defensive typing.
you literally listed counterplay to garg in this post
Water Absorb Seismitoad vs. Dracovish.
If we have to fish to the bottom of the dumpster, there is usually a problem.
Wogerpon is a solid mon in its own right though? With Dracovish vs Seismitoad, seismitoad is a RU pokemon. Wogerpon is already a solid wallbreaker.
EDIT: changed the wording a little bit, forgot how to english for a moment
Hey I know Kyurem isn’t a topic of conversation anymore, but what are good switch ins to it besides Volc and Blissey? I’ve been trying to build balance and it constantly blows holes in my team.
you say this as if ogerpon is switching in on garganacl. what garganacl counterplay actually looks like is clefable + covert cloak spam and no one wants to play that garbage
slowking-G
Glowking. The balance GOAT.
I specifically mentioned once Ogerpon-W is banned, we must resort to CC Amonguss. That is an indictment on ‘Guss being complete ass in a sleepless (+Gholdengo) metagame. Hence, Seismitoad vs. Dracovish.
Stealth Rock. There aren’t really switch ins. You just have to have a solid defensive backbone and keep it from coming in too often. Things like Volcarona + Fairy / Corviknight can work.
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I’ve been using Glwoking but have been disappointed. It doesn’t handle really more than one hit from Kyurem. Earth power or specs ice beam tears right through it.
yh thats bc kyurem shouldve been banned. pair it with a freeze dry resist though
252 SpA Choice Specs Kyurem Ice Beam vs. 252 HP / 240+ SpD Slowking-Galar: 151-178 (38.3 - 45.1%) -- guaranteed 3HKO
If it clicks Earth Power go to a Flying type.
This sort of sounds like balance isn’t really viable lol.
Yeah I guess I need to threaten it right away not really viable to stay in with Glowking.
it’s madness to me that kyurem remains in the tier.
how did we arrive at a point where a pokemon with bulk that can only be revenged by strong super effective stab moves, and only one measure of counter play - namely hazards pressure, which itself can be removed, is acceptable?
not only that, it has the means to bypass the one real check to it in blissey lol, a shitmon that only fits on one style, along with a multitude of sets - not that it needs anything other than tera ice specs to be too powerful (i love my fat gholdengo getting blown up by a move it resists).
kyurem also clearly has undue influence on the meta & what are considered viable teams. balance is dead because of kyurem - what remains is ho & bo that stacks pokémon faster than kyurem.
along with being overbearingly powerful in raw numbers, it has literally zero positive impact on the meta. it just makes you shit your pants when it’s in.
how did we arrive at a point where a pokemon with bulk that can only be revenged by strong super effective stab moves, and only one measure of counter play - namely hazards pressure, which itself can be removed, is acceptable?
not only that, it has the means to bypass the one real check to it in blissey lol, a shitmon that only fits on one style, along with a multitude of sets - not that it needs anything other than tera ice specs to be too powerful (i love my fat gholdengo getting blown up by a move it resists).
kyurem also clearly has undue influence on the meta & what are considered viable teams. balance is dead because of kyurem - what remains is ho & bo that stacks pokémon faster than kyurem.
along with being overbearingly powerful in raw numbers, it has literally zero positive impact on the meta. it just makes you shit your pants when it’s in.
Defensively garg is tough to handle but offense can slice through it. I mean Rockpon is right there and it ruins Garg even if wellspring gets banned, and need I mention Gliscor who consistently beats Garg thanks to poison heal. Garg is annoying like Gliscor yes, but neither are broken anymore, since Gliscor feels killable now. Gliscor has to worry about Weavile constantly now and the general powercreep of the metagame from Ubers drops and movepools additions makes both of their lives a bit worse
gliscor doesn't beat curse or even just ID garg and I'd argue that even non-setup garg negates its recovery with salt cure which means it's losing health overall, especially when switching in on the rocks set by garg itself. For reference I do not believe that garg is going to be broken in a no-woger meta but this is just incorrect.
I imagine garg might be overpowered in a lower power level metagame once a lot of the overpowered offensive threats in the tier are gone, but right now I don't think Garg is noteworthy. In a lot of respects its healthy; with tera it can blanket check a lot defensively, and it can wall double-status pult, which is a nightmare to deal with.
Sleep wasn't banned because it's inherently overpowered or anything. (The only good pokemon impacted by the sleep ban was amoongus, oh no iron valiant lost an option whatever will we do). Sleep was banned because the existence of Sleep Clause Mod was inconsistent with modern tiering policy and an objectively terrible Darkrai set winning important battles was the straw that broke the camerupt's back in terms of making the decision to have tiering policy be correct. I would also have liked yawn to stay legal but complex bans suck shit.
Not to single you out since I’ve seen similar takes often, but banning something to “ease teambuilding” has never made sense to me.
For example, we banned Arch so one might think teambuilding got easier since you don’t need to account for rain as much, except the lack of Arch/rain made waterpon and gouging fire way better imo.
Let’s say we ban goug now maybe volc gets more dangerous. So we ban that and now gambit and iron valiant are harder to deal with.
These are just examples but point is more bans doesn’t necessarily equal easier teambuilding.
I feel like this entire gen a lot of people always think we’re “One or two bans away from an ideal meta” and then we make the bans and turns out the meta still isn’t what we wanted cuz every ban has complicated effects on the meta that are hard to predict.
Therefore I’d rather see the meta settle for some time after bans instead of suspecting whatever happens to be the top threat of the past two weeks.
I think this metagame is inevitably going to be a “sorta-broken checks sorta-broken” type of deal and the solution is to find the right balance instead of constantly suspecting whatever the crowd thinks is the most sorta-broken thing of the week.
EDIT: I’m not saying volc will be broken if we ban Goug. I’m just using it as an example for the effects of banning something.
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the issue with yawn isn't just complex bans either. yawn with sleep clause mod means that all you have to do as counterplay is sack a single mon and then switch to something else while they can't yawn again. but if there's no mod, the concept of sacking something to sleep moves is meaningless. effectively, you're forced to switch every turn if something is spamming yawn to avoid getting something put to sleep, and if you slip up and let something fall asleep, you can't risk switching out because you risk them predicting your switch and trapping you in a yawn loop again. this would encourage the kind of degeneracy that would make even funbro users go "ok, that's a bit much"
I disagree with this. Right now, there are clearly too many threats in the meta to reasonably handle, and something like Gouging Fire is stupidly broken and warps teambuilding to a horrible extent.
I do not believe that Volcarona will get much better with Gouging Fire's ban, and on the otherhand, I potentially see Rona being easier to handle after Gouging Fire's ban since a hugely meta-warping threat will be gone, which opens up the builder for more counterplay to Volcarona even though Gouging Fire itself happens to check Rona since much of the counterplay to either mon does not overlap with the other.
Balance teams love Kyurem though. Kyurem typically fits best on teams with Gking and Corv - Pokemon that aren't best known for being HO staples. These teams are best able to pivot Kyurem into advantageous positions where it is able to fire off Ice Beams / Freeze Drys. Being weak to hazards in a meta where hazards are impossible to remove is a big issue though Kyurem can somewhat make up for this with Boots + Corv / Tusk support (not a fan of Tusk + Kyurem structs tho due to the massive weakness overlap).
Furthermore, balance teams are typically able to slot in stronger checks to kyurem than most other styles. Garg, Clefable, and GKing are great checks on balance that I am running for more than Kyurem.
Other styles have good checks too. Bulky Offense has good checks, including Volcarona, AV Iron Crown, Gking, Balloon Gambit, ballon Ghold, AV Hatt, etc. And stall to my understanding doesn't struggle with Kyurem either.
Kyurem's set variety and Freeze chance are factors that arguably push it over the line. I'm still 50/50 on how healthy I believe it to be, but it would have been a better Pokemon to suspect later. Its very difficult to see Kyurem as overpowered when Raging Bolt exists, has a better typing, priority, Calm Mind, and Protosynthesis Draco Meteor or weather ball to nuke every "check" on balance, whether it be Ting-Lu, Clodsire, etc. Out of the 6 "OP Dragons" (Kyurem, Dragapult, Roaring Moon, Raging Bolt, Gouging Fire, Archaludon) I found Kyurem to be the most reasonable one to deal with. When 5+ more Pokmeon are more broken than you (including others like Waterpon), it becomes difficult to confidently that it is broken.
This is why PP exists your never going to need to sacrifice something, slipping up is possible but outright losing something isn't.
Okay, but what if we used clefable or serp like normal people and it turned out that garganacl wasn’t actually broken because even max spdef cannot take special hits that well?