First lemee just say that I'm only theorymoning here. I'm not an expert on the tiers below OU.
Before we talk about splitting NU into separate tiers, we should recall the
purpose of tiers in the first place.
The purpose of the RarelyUsed tier, under my proposal, would be summarized as:
Basically, Pokemon that aren't strong enough to make the UU list (based on usage), but are also used far more than NU.
Yes, that would be splitting NU into two tiers. That's pretty much what people want isn't it? Either that or a NU ban list. Or both? I'm not sure a NU banlist would be necessary if a RU tier existed.
One way or another, we're ending up with a
gigantic NU list. Gen 5 added 156 Pokemon (82? that are fully evolved). Even with Reshiram and Zekrom auto-banned to Ubers, and Victini and Kyurem possibly banned to BL, and that still increases the total number of Pokemon by 152 (78).
Assuming 53 is "roughly" the cutoff (I'm just guesstimating here), we're looking at approximately these Pokemon in the tiers under my proposal,
with last month's statistics:
Uber: 19, plus OU and below
OU: 53 (Ferrothorn to Tornadus), plus BL and below
BL: If Victini and Kyurem aren't moved to OU they'll most likely be BL. Gen 4 ended with 11 in BL, Gen 5 will probably be about the same.
UU: 53 (Espeon to Xatu). Notables have been extensively covered by others, but include Chansey, Togekiss, Slowbro, Azelf, Kingdra, Celebi, Milotic, Suicune, Mew, Snorlax, Smeargle, Victini, Cresselia, Kyurem, Shaymin.
RU: 53, Ludicolo to Golduck in usage. Notables include Yanmega, Porygon-Z, Rotom-H, Deoxys-D, Shuckle, Uxie, Wobbuffet, Scyther, Slowking.
NU: Everything else. Includes Cobalion and Rotom-C. Total number would be roughly 471 or so, including NFEs.
If Pokemon too powerful for NU needed to be banned, I suppose a true NU banlist would work. Either that or automatically designate them RU.
We could, in theory, institute a ban list for RU and NU, but what would you call them? BL1, BL2, BL3? I'd be willing to bet that the nuisance/broken Pokemon for NU would all end up in RU anyway from a usage perspective, and would negate the need for lower tier banlists. UU's ban list covers the vast majority of problem Pokemon anyhow for the lower tiers. I'm generally in favor of as few ban lists as necessary; Uber and UU's BL
should be more than sufficient, no?