OU Suspect Testing Round 4 Voter Identification and Nominations

[DC.]

-13 is my lucky number.

All weather changing abilities: I was originally against this but after taking a minute to think about it, I realize now how stupid they are. They make us have complex bans to avoid banning tons of swift swimmers, useless item bans like bright powder/lax incense and now even make pokemon like Garchomp broken just by being completely uncompetitive. All this for a less enjoyable metagame. I'd rather keep more pokemon than keep this abilities that are ruining what could potentially be a fun metagame. I'm nominating all of them, and not just drizzle and sand stream which are obviously the most powerful ones, due to the reason that hail and sun are overpowered in a metagame without the first two.

Unban Manaphy: If the weather ban actually happens, then I think it would be for the best to retest manaphy in an OU environment where rain is not present.

That would be all

 

[baddjordan]

Jcpdragonx, damn i decayed a bit.

Nominating:

Thundurus: 0 counters (Although uncommon, it gets Grass Knot). The Nasty Plot set even beats Chansey. 111 speed allows Thundurus to out speed almost everything it needs to out speed, such at lati@s, horses, Garchomp, etc. Priority T-wave means your non ground/volt absorb "check" to Thundurus is going to be crippled.

Excadrill: To reliably check this, you need be running a Gliscor or Skarm (rain teams and rotom-w do okay). Slowbro doesn't ohko after scald if it matteres at all. After a boost + Sandstorm its speed and attack are beyond a joke. Also, you may laugh, but the rock slide flinches are really really gay. 30% chance isnt that bad, but its still there. If you rely on a weakened Gliscor or Skarm and you get flinched good luck. Excadrill can also freely spin on Skarm meaning skarm doesn't totally render Excadrill useless.

 

[TheFourthChaser]

<------- fast break pts

Drizzle, Drought, Sand Stream:I think the effects these weathers are having on the metagame are horrible, most games become weather wars with the first weather mon to die losing the game. Some people want to get rid of abusers, Excadrill, Garchomp, etc but you'll end up with less bans this way. I'm not nomming Hail because I don't find it nearly as good/easy to abuse as the other 3 and having the weakest auto weather in the metagame should not be that harmful and might actually help.

 

[Giga Punch]

Confirming as Achilles Steel

 

[The Grand Babido]

confirming as the now no longer secret trainer

and also as nattorious big

my nominations will be:

sandstream -

drought -

drizzle -

snow warning -

choice specs -

 

[jrrrrrrr]

Identifying as jrrrrrrr

my nominations are:

All Auto-Weather abilities I'm going to nominate them individually as well, but if we get a "ban all weather" option then I will be voting for it. The entire OU metagame has turned into weather wars and it's making the tier stale in my opinion. So many matches come down to Politoed vs Tyranitar, I'm getting sick of it and I know I'm not the only one who feels this way. Instead of picking and choosing parts of weather teams to ban in a feeble attempt to make things balanced, we should just ban the enablers and end the discussion completely so that we can enjoy BW before the next generation comes.

Sand Stream Sand Stream enables two of the most nominated pokemon to wreak havoc on OU, and it makes the #1 most used pokemon into a special wall that can even counter threats with Super Effective STAB moves against it. I highly doubt people would consider Garchomp and Excadrill broken if it wasn't for Sand Stream. Sand Stream also forces almost everything in the game to use Leftovers, which takes a lot of options away in a metagame we want to be diverse. Sand Stream is the reason why 3 of the top 8 pokemon are Tyranitar, Garchomp and Excadrill. You could put any other 3 pokemon with them on a team and have a good chance of making ratings. It is by far the best weather effect in a metagame dominated by controlling the weather.

Drought Drought gives too many offensive threats the tools they need to power through any other kind of team without really thinking. Fire + Grass types get really good boosts added to their already solid defensive cohesion. Fire-types get double STAB and a weakness removed, while the Grass-types get double Speed and a boosted Growth. Drought wouldn't be banworthy unless it supported other pokemon to unreasonable levels, but it does exactly this. Even the pathetic Sawsbuck and Lilligant become deadly sweepers under the Sun, while Victini and Venusaur go from "threatening but beatable" to "basically uncounterable". Drought gives too many pokemon steep bonuses for an entire match. It's only counterable by abusing other weather types, which says a lot about the state of OU in general.

Drizzle Even without Swift Swim abusers, Drizzle has a huge impact on the metagame and enables some pokemon to go from threatening to uncounterable. For example, Thundurus becomes impossible to counter on paper when it's allowed to use Nasty Plot + STAB Thunder. Tornadus and Dragonite, as well as random things like Surf Latios become impossibly hard to prepare for without weather abusers of your own. It's pretty telling that an otherwise awful pokemon like Politoed becomes top 15 in usage because of one change in ability, even when you don't consider how easy it is to build a great rain team.

Snow Warning Hail may be the "worst" of the weathers but it still gives the user notable advantages in an otherwise weatherless metagame. Ice is one of the best attacking types in the game, and Blizzard is a terrifying move with perfect accuracy. Many top pokemon are decimated under Hail, and in the interest of being fair to the other weather enablers I think it needs to be banned as well. Weather inducers are a huge problem in the metagame, as you can tell by the nominations in this thread they enable quite a few pokemon to be more powerful than they should be.

Unban BrightPowder/Lax Incense "Evasion Items" These may technically be banned under Evasion Clause, so please excuse this nomination if that's the case. It is my understanding that anything banned by the suspect test process can also be unbanned by it, so I am making this nom just in case. These items barely add Evasion boosts, and are only notable because of Sand Veil Garchomp, which is only notable because of the broken weather effect caused by Sand Stream. There is only a small handful of pokemon that benefit from holding these items, and even then it is usually an inferior option. If the Evasion enabling abilities are banned then I see no reason to keep these useless items banned.

Unban Manaphy This nomination is only if Drizzle is banned, but since we're not allowed to do conditional nominations I'm putting it here to be safe. Without Drizzle support, Manaphy is vulnerable to status and loses a STAB boost. Even with Tail Glow or Calm Mind, the metagame has evolved to become fast enough to beat Manaphy. Ferrothorn is the #2 most common pokemon and it walls Manaphy completely. 100 base Speed isn't what it used to be. I think Manaphy may become a reasonable pokemon in the OU tier if Drizzle gets banned, but if Drizzle doesn't get banned then people will rightfully laugh this nomination out completely.

Unban Blaziken I was never convinced that it was broken in the first place, and the new usage statistics tell me it will still have the same old problems it always had. It can't switch in without taking massive amounts of damage, it's utterly destroyed by status (save for its burn immunity), and most of the top pokemon completely own it (Excadrill in sand, Gliscor, Garchomp, Jellicent, Starmie, Reuniclus). It lacks the movepool to hurt everything, and it will have hard counters/checks no matter what set you use. Even resisted priority moves can 2hko Blaziken, and things like Scarfed Latios can even revenge kill it after a Speed Boost. I will only take this nomination to unban back if Drought isn't banned, because with permanent Sunlight Blaziken becomes a whole different beast. We should at least unban Blaze Blaziken, but I don't think that's an option due to "rules"

 

[undisputed]

I am Rain Man and Tim Lincecum.

Nominations:

Sandstorm - its too good. all the top teams are sand storm which means its the best weather.

Drizzle - far superior to non weather teams. boosted sweepers like Thundurus and Tornadus are very difficult to handle even with good prediction.

Drought - not very good in comparison to sand storm and drizzle, but in the absence of those two, it's incredibly difficult to stop.

Snow Warning - there have been good hail teams and it has a clear advantage over non weather teams. if other weathers go, so should hail

Thundurus - Nasty Plot koes everything and you have to be willing to sac whatever it comes in on to prevent set up.

FUK WEATHER, LONG LIVE CLEAR SKIES

 

[Blightbringer]

im somewhat new

hi This is what I think:

unban brightpowder/lax incense - I guess I'm sort of a libertine (heh not really!) when it comes to Pokemon but i really don't think things like brightpowder warrant a ban whatsoever. the "luck" it injects into the metagame is negligible especially when a superior item could be used in its place; after all, they activate very rarely.

destroy OHKO clause

ban Drizzle - despite my fondness for Rain teams, i can see that they're pretty ridiculous. it creates highly favorable conditions for A LOT of Pokemon. shit like Skarmory under Rain is able to wall pretty much any Dragon-type and almost anything else without a STAB super-effective move. many things also get massive power boosts (i.e, anything with Water STAB), making it virtually impossible to wall them.

ban Garchomp

 

[Avira]

Nominations:

Thundurus: It has an excellent offensive stat distribution and at +2 with a Nasty Plot, NOTHING walls it at all. It forces a lot of switches, resulting in easy boosts and with Thunderbolt or Thunder in the presence of rain, Focus Blast, and HP Ice, it deals tremendous damage to anything that cannot strike back first.

Excadrill: The speed boost under the sand make it difficult to revenge and the sheer power it gets from Swords Dance make Skarmory and Gliscor unreliable checks. If the Excadrill user decides to run Rapid Spin over Return/Frustration, it can get free spins against stall teams as Jellicent cannot switch into Excadrill reliably, allowing many Pokemon to get more switch-ins to wreak havoc on the opposing team.

Sand Veil + Sand Stream: Evasion is just uncompetitive. People run 100% accurate moves because they expect their moves to work reliably. Sand Veil takes away this, making all moves except those that never miss, less accurate. Whether it be one crucial miss, or several misses over the course of a match, the advantage gained by those using Sand Veil is too significant. A complex ban prevents the outright ban of Pokemon that do not have a second ability.

Snow Cloak + Snow Warning: Same reasons as above

 

[Requiem[9]]

John Wayne, Gareth Brown.

Nominations:
Excadrill: Seeing Gliscor on teams like Politoad/Thunderus/Tornadus/Starmie/Nattorei is really kind of heartbreaking. In order not to just lose against Excadrill with a non-rain or sun team, teams need Gliscor or Skamory, two of the most exploitable and easily overloadable pokemon in the metagame, for one of which there exists an instant-kill button. Both of which are almost always a Rock Slide flinch away from oblivion. Other checks like Slowbro, Reuniclus, and Tangrowth are sketchy since +2 X-Scissor all but kills all three and Conkeldurr and Azumarill are flimsy and only present a 50/50 standoff where the Excadrill user still stands to lose much less from a mispredict. Things like Garchomp and Landorus are vaguely possible as checks but require severely risky play. It bothers me that players need to run at least one of 2 specific pokemon to really make it a fair game of pokemon and that they need at least one of very few checks to make it a favorable one: with any amount of team support, Excadrill sweeps through its "counters" and, with no team support, it sweeps through everything else. Of course, with a well-built offensive team, it's vaguely possible to get away with 1-2 checks; Sun has proven this by being, overwhelmingly, at the top of the leaderboard and teams like Franky's, PK_Gaming's, or even my own from last period show that it is possible to pressure Excadrill to take advantage of Excadrill offensively. It's only the presence of these teams that keeps me from feeling it overwhelmingly broken, but... I'd definitely like to support its nomination.

Sand Veil + Snow Cloak: This has gotten a lot less popular because of jokes about Cacturne and Glaceon but, honestly, it can't at all be fun to miss against either. Players don't use them because they aren't much good outside of hax and need more misses to function, but two misses with the promise of more against SD Cacturne or Specs Glaceon cannot be fun. While these are rare situations, they should not be a situation at all. I agree that Gliscor is relatively benign, but that's only because it never runs offensive EVs and is only ever used to soften and spread status. But, I'm sure SD-Sand Veil Gliscor could make at least a few players ragequit. Practically, this doesn't have much of an effect on play at all: it only keeps people from spamming bad sets on bad pokemon. As such, it makes a lot of sense to me to make sure those bad sets on bad pokemon never win games. Given its newly mediocre speed tier and the option of so many other, unique dragons beside it, I don't think Garchomp is at all broken beyond Sand Veil: it's solid stats and good STABs and functional -- not at all spectacular relative to pokemon like Thunderus or Terrakion -- sweeping ability let players feel good about abusing its ability, but it's really the ability that people are abusing. In the probable event that my explanations aren't thorough enough or that this doesn't get enough support, I'd like to nominate Garchomp.

Thunderus: Literally a moveslot away from Camerupt being its only counter in a metagame bereft of checks thanks to Ferrothorn, it's far too strong a sweeper. Everything in the world is 2HKO'd by it, it has Nasty Plot, priority Thunder Wave, a better effective speed tier than even Garchomp in generation 4, fantastic typing, and great coverage. It's not impossible to keep from setting up, though it'll often get at least one kill every switch-in in the process. It's only crippled, really, by its Stealth Rock weakness -- which it overcomes with Leftovers -- and its frailty. Though, I think that the main reason why Thunderus is so dangerous isn't so much that it's a scary pokemon, though it is, but that the metagame doesn't reward the use of Scarfers because of Sand Stream and Chlorophyll and that the metagame doesn't really reward the use of pokemon faster than Thunderus because of Nattorei (and Sand Stream and Chlorophyll). I think that if anything were banned or something were adjusted, the metagame could possibly adapt to Thunderus; but, I think that at least one big thing needs to go from the current metagame and I'd be content if that thing were Thunderus.

 

[Kinglypuff]

Confirming as Kinglypuff.


Thundurus : Basically, this thing has no counters. Nothing can switch on him without being at least 2HKO. Only Starmie (or irrelevant pokemons) can outspeed him, but it's a proper OHKO on the switch. Killing Thundurus needs at least one sac, and I believe it's too much. Thundurus has to go

Garchomp : Garchomp is one of the most threatening pokemon in the metagame. His stellar base attack added to his respectable speed can make a miss crucial, thanks to his ability (that's why Subchomp is popular !). People are talking about a new speed tier, wich make Garchomp manageable... But who can come on a Sub and hit twice without being killed ? I'm not even talking about the miss rate. Yes, Subchomp is countered by Skarmory a Bronzong. But what if he carries Fire Fang, or even Fireblast ? Garchomp's counters are unreliable because of misses, and some sets can just get rid of them. That's not what I call "counter".

 

[Playa]

Confirming as pokeman21.

 

[Pidge]

testmansam, which used to be much higher before decay :(

ban Garchomp - Missing against this thing can cost you the game. With Substitute, abusing Sand Veill becomes easier. I don't think any other Sand Veil users can be on the threatening level that Garchomp is, so ban Garchomp instead of Sand Veil.

unban Brightpowder and Lax Incense - I believe as few bans as needed and possible should be done. These items aren't any more likely to turn the game around by chance than an Ice Beam freezing a Pokemon. Additionally, you miss out on the use of another item, which makes it a liability to use these items when it's likely they won't even activate at all.

 

[mien]

Hidden Machine

I hope i do not get accused for abusing the lack of rule regarding a maximum length for nominations. The original was about 3 times as long and i tried to shorten it as much as possible.

I wish to nominate Lugia to test it's performance in the current BW OU metagame. After doing an in debt analyse regarding this pokemon's capabilities, i predict they will rather be underwhelming for a 680 base stats pokemon. Probably not as rare as Kyurem but not as omnipresent like Tyranitar (who has about 660-670 basestats in sand), residing somewhere in between.

For this argument, i'll be examining Lugia's performance against the top 20 most used pokemon in this metagame as they form the very core of what we know as the BW OU metagame. Any pokemon who is rarely succesfull against these threaths both defensive and offensive or can provide significant support in the form of permanent weather, cannot hope to achieve the dominate the metagame, or becoming banned altogether.

Summary of Lugia:

- Absurd high walling stats comparable to Cresselia

Lugia's main and only selling point, however as shown by Cresselia's current usage those are clearly not enough for a dominant force in the metagame.

- Vulnerability to Sandstream and all status, weakness to Stealth Rock nullifies the advantages of a Spikes/Toxic Spikes immunity.

Nearly any succesful wall in the fifth generation enjoys near complete immunity to residual damage. Which proves that it is something considered necessary before adding it into the team. The only exception to this is Jellicent who is probably still used for its immunity to Rapid spin, a novelty Lugia lacks as well. Lack of Toxic immunity can be lethal at times, once poisoned Lugia can be determinded as near useless the rest of the game.

- Lack of a reliable resistance spread(Grass, Fighting, Psychic and Ground immunity)

In generation 5 where everything hits ridiculously hard, raw defensive basestats are not enough to take repeated hits. This is clearly shown in the statistics by the popularity of Gliscor, Skarmory, and Ferrothorn who have pretty much the best defensive typings in the game. Grass and Psychic are rather useless resistances while Fighting and Ground isn't enough for reliable walling. Considering the fact that nearly all ground and Fighting types have a move that hits Lugia by super effective damage. In other words Lugia will often have to face full damage from offense taking attacks twice as hard as the other walls who often completely resist a sweeper by their typing alone, essentially nullifiying the base stat advantage.

- Average movepool and ability.

Unlike some fellow ubers like Mewtwo and Kyogre, Lugia is really lacking in this department. Whirlwind, Toxic, Screens, Thunder Wave and Roost are all moves who can be found on nearly any flying type. It can utilize Toxic but it lacks the Fire/Fighting moves necessary to deal with the Steel types immune to it. It doesn't have any entry hazards to make use of the switches it forces, nor does it have Taunt to prevent sweepers from setting up and walls for setting up their entry hazards with little to no fear.

Pressure has the rather limited usage of a PP staller. While PP stalling with Lugia's massive walling stats may seem interesting at first, it unfortunatly lacks the offenses Zapdos has to deal with those who are immune to Poison. Seeing as its Stab's are both resisted by Steel and only has one moveslot to spare for offense. As a result it will only become set up bait for the like of Scizor and Excadrill or for those who set up entry hazards like Ferrothorn and Excadrill.

Defensive Lugia vs most popular threats
(Note: All these matchups take Stealth Rock into account of both sides, considering its presence is such that it has become a part of a common battle condition)

Tyranitar: Lugia 'can' win 1 on 1 if it utilizes a set with the Reflect/Roost/Toxic combination to the fullest. Provided Lugia is facing the more common defensive Tyranitar rather than the still used CB Tyranitar. Needless to say Lugia won't be switching into Tyranitar anywhere soon.

Ferrothorn: This defensive threat can always switch into Lugia with little to no fear. Even the rather orthodox Hidden Power Fire will fail to land a 3HKO. Meanwhile Forrethorn can leech seed to recover damage, lay down entry hazards or cripple Lugia through status.

Garchomp: Garchomp won't be a problem for Lugia as long as it carries Ice beam or to a lesser extend Whirlwind. The only exception is in case Garchomp carries Choice Band and Lugia is unable to outspeed. Another is the notorious 'sand veil' misses however this can be applied to everything.

Scizor: Lugia lacks any moves to prevent the popular SD scizor from setting up in front of it. Even the most defensive of Lugia cannot survive repeated hits of a +6 LO Bug bite after Reflect. Lugia can choose to run Hidden Power Fire instead however, will become set up bait for Garchomp instead.

Gliscor: See garchomp

Latios:Choice Spec's Draco Meteor deals 56.5% - 66.6% damage, which is a swift 2HKO after SR. Lugia would need max SpD/HP investment to ensure surviving the combination of 2 Draco Meteors and Stealth Rock. However this particular investment would severly limit Lugia's ability to defeat Physicall sweepers.

Rotom-W: To beat it 1 on 1, Lugia would need to roost repeatedly to survive repeated Thunderbolts. This can be succesfull provided Rotom never lands a paralyze not a crit. Lugia doesn't make a decent switchin into Rotom however.

Excadrill: Lugia can't do much more than attempt to Whirlwind away its boosts, provided Excadrill switched into Lugia rather than the other way round, in which case Lugia will fall.

Reuniclus: Any non-whirlwind set is set up bait for the CM set. Needless those say who do carry it will only delay the problem towards the end game. After 6 CM's Psychic does enough damage for a 2HKO. Lugia 'can' wall the Trick room sweeper as Shadow Ball does less than half, however will eventually be forced to switch due to SpD drops

Heatran: Neither pokemon can hurt each other which means Lugia will win due to Pressure stalling. Lugia will have to be wary for those who run Toxic or Lava Plume which appear to be more common higher on the ladder and in tournaments.

Jirachi: Lugia is a sitting duck in front of the most popular set(wish/para support). While Jirachi may not be able to beat Lugia, it can still switch in, paralyze and support the team through Wish.

Dragonite: See Garchomp

Conkeldurr: A Poisoned +2 Conkulldur does 54.8% - 64.9% damage with Payback to a max Def/HP Lugia with Reflect. Which means that unless Lugia carries Aeroblast or Psychic it will not be able to switch in and stall it with Poison.

Politoed: A choice Spec's Hydro Pump does 62% - 73.1% which is a swift 2HKO. Lugia does not make a solid switchin to the defensive set either due to Toxic.

Gengar: A LO Shadow Ball does 56.7% - 66.8% damage to Lugia, i suppose this is a no-brainer.

Skarmory: See Ferrothorn

Thundurus: See Gengar

Jellicent: Neither can switch in each other due to the threat of status

Starmie: LO Hydro Pump does 52.6% - 62% damage to 252 HP Lugia. Lugia usually can't touch starmie due to its Ice resist and Natural Cure.

Volcorona:
Offensive: +1 Quiver dance does 65.1% - 76.7% damage to 252 HP Lugia
Chestorest: Lugia can't touch this due to this set's immunity to Toxic.
Defensive Morning Sun: This set is only used in permanent sun which does 62% - 73.1% damage to Lugia with a +1 Fire blast

Summary: Out of the entire top 20 the 'Great Wall' set only reliably counters Heatran, Garchomp, Dragonite and Gliscor. These results are laughable considering Quagsire can do the same and wall several others. Lugia may be able to wall a few others with a different ev spread and moveset however will have to sacrifice the ability to counter those mentioned above.



CM Lugia

Often mentioned as the 'unbeatable CM'er' in arguments that defends Lugia's uber status. However with a closer look one can find a reliable method to deal with this set without having to significantly change your current team. I will spare the reader for another list of matchups and rather write down a summary of how it can be done.

- Any random wall that has Toxic beats this set. Substitude or Resttalk may prevent this but makes it near impossible to sweep due to lack of coverage.
- Tyranitar will always beat the CM set if it doesn't carry HP Fighting. Do note that even HP Fighting does not guarantee winning against a t-tar that switched in. Considering the CB set set can OHKO with SE while HP fighting has a 'chance' to 2HKO after one CM.
- Ferrothorn and Scizor can switch in any set that lacks HP Fire. Ferrothorn cannot defeat Lugia but Leech seed and Sandstorm will make it near impossible for Lugia to sweep. It can't beat Jirachi either even after 6 boosts, Skarmory can whirlwind repeatedly and stack Stealth Rock damage.
- CM Reuniclus with Psychock always wins
- There is pretty much nothing in this metagame where Lugia can easily set up in front of it.


Summary: Despite the insane defensive stats the CM set may not be as difficult to defeat as it seems. It lacks the offenses and reliable STAB's to defeat it's counters after just one Calm Mind. To make things worse residual damage will make its life hell severly reducing its massive defenses. When compared to the current dominant CM'er Reuniclus it appears that Lugia is inferior.



Final conclusion (for the TL:DR amongst you)

Lugia is what one could call a two sided sword. One who has the stats of an uber but the movepool, typing and ability combination of something that belongs in the newfound RU tier. The result seems to be something that balances out, something that will most likely find its spot on several ou teams but not enough to become top tier nevermind being broken.

Perhaps i have overlooked something during this in-debt argument. One cannot possible predict every outcome through theorymon alone in this complex strategy game. However one thing is certain, the total base stats of a pokemon alone are not enough in this metagame to perform well. Kyurem's low usage has proven this and the thought that something with 430 basestats like Quagsire to seemingly wall more than Lugia show this as well.

Any test or experiment should always start from a solid hypothesis. I hope that the hypothesis shown above can prove that Lugia is worth the time and effort for attempting a suspect test

 

[Mosh]

Confirming as Brian Molko, Baby Says, Kill me Sarah and Feral (yeah, I am that stupid to play with 4 alts)

My nominations:

Tropius: This beast is unstoppable with harvest and Sitrus berry regaining hips of HP every turn.. I mean it's almost impossible to take more HP than what he gains every turn, no to mention he can make the effect even greater with leech seed and substitute/protect stalling. The raw power of air slash is ridiculous and he can even boost it to higher proportions using Growth, and with his amazing typing, defenses and huge movepool there will be plenty of free turns to do so. There's no real counter to him since every single pokemon in the game will either lose to leech seed or air slash forcing you to sac one monster every time he enters the battlefield

Parasect: With the imminent Tropius' ban the only thing that kept Parasect to torn teams apart will be gone and I can't see a healthy metagame with this guy around without the flying dinosaur to take care of the problem. It's hard enought to counter him nowadays since you never know what set he will be using: the sub effect spore stalling or the Dry Skin + Rain tank and if you guess it wrong it's pretty much one pokemon you lose (a similar scenario to the Mix/DD Mence em DPPt), imagine that without his best check and you have chaos. And i'm only talking about his sweeping abilities, I won't even start with the support he can give to any team with Spore and his amazing typing and defense making him to easily wall pretty much the entire metagame.

 

[SkyNet]

Confirming as Rainbow! and SkyNet

No Nominations from me.

 

[Nachos]

I am Nachos and I support a Sand Stream + Sand Veil ban as Garchomp is a good pokemon for the metagame that should not go because of an uncompetitive ability. With Blaziken, it was a combination of Speed Boost and Hi Jump Kick which is what got it nominated. It was more clear cut than Garchomp who is simply getting nominated because of ability alone.

 

[SJCrew]

SJ Hero and Ninja Gaiden in the house.

Nominations:

Garchomp: I chose to support a Garchomp ban instead of Sand Veil because missing against Garchomp is far more vital than missing against the odd Cacturne or Gliscor. Being such a fast, powerful, and bulky Pokemon with few counters as is, it already has a huge margin for error. Substitute + Swords Dance sets force more opportunities for setup under the Sand by allowing the player to bank on a miss and beat faster checks easily, even if they don't miss. Even without the safety of its Substitute, revenging a Garchomp always sends your heartbeat into a panic knowing it still has a 20% chance to dodge any attack. Under the common condition of Sand, there is no reliable strategy for beating Garchomp other than praying you don't miss so that the Pokemon designated to deal with it aren't decimated anyway.

Thundurus - I've been resisting support for Thundurus's ban under the guise that it's a Pokemon that doesn't seem like it should be broken. After all, it is a Stealth Rock weak Pokemon with horrible defenses and a power level we're not unfamiliar with. What's the big deal with this guy?

For starters, Nasty Plot. This is what makes things like Blissey or other common specially defensive tanks non-issues, since it can go for the OHKO or 2HKO easily once it's boosted, whereas similar Pokemon like Zapdos bite the bullet and get walled. 111 base Speed is also a hair faster than most of our current metagame, so it's pretty difficult to revenge too without a designated Scarfer. Even if you have a number of checks ready to beat it before it can sweep, it's not any easier to switch into; Thunderbolt/Thunder, HP Ice, and Focus Blast have flawless coverage. Most checks, like Scarfled Tyranitar or Landlos, Excadrill, etc. are vulnerable to at least one of those moves and risks dying on the switch. Others, like Specially Defensive Quagsire or Jolteon, are just not good Pokemon overall and are very uncommon in the tier.

It sounds annoying to deal with now, but wait, it gets better: Prankster gives its Thunder Wave +1 priority! Even if it's not running Nasty Plot and you can get a faster check in safely, Thundurus can make it useless before it goes down by removing its Speed, or even killing it if the 25% chance for immobility rolls in its favor that same turn. Thundurus is not only irritating, but insanely effective and just not beatable through conventional means.

Drizzle - Even without Swift Swim, there are still a dangerous number of Pokemon that become unruly while Rain is active. Scizor and Ferrothorn will not die to random HP Fires (and in Ferrothorn's case, not even suffer a 2HKO), the genies get free 120 BP STAB moves with dangerous 30% secondary effects, Latios is harder to beat with what is essentially a third STAB, and offensive Water types like Starmie or even Politoed itself just hit obnoxiously hard. Part of the reason why there is a weather war in OU to begin with is that unless you turn off the Rain, it can very easily beat any other playstyle by overpowering it with consecutive boosted attacks. With Drizzle gone, we are one step closer to ending this weather war and playing genuinely strategic games where our success does not hinge on whether or not Tyranitar or Politoed are alive by the end of the match.

EDIT: i did not know haxorus had a mouth

 

[Blue_Star]

I'm Blue Star.

Nominating:

Thundurus because he's a very potent special attacker (2HKOes specially defensive Jirachi after Spikes) but can also beat its counters, such as beating Blissey with Taunt + Hammer Arm. Sure it's frail and can be revenged by a scarfer/faster pokemon, but if you do that, you run the risk of getting your scarfer paralyzed by a +1 Thunder Wave.

And Garchomp because it's also very overpowered. Sure, it has only 102 speed and can't boost it, so we just use something faster with ice beam/dragon attacks, but Garchomp might use Substitute as you send your Latios and now you're in danger. Pokemon who can wall Garchomp, like Skarmory/Bronzong, run the risk of getting fire blastet/fanged, so you need to have BOTH a Skarmory/Latios to counter 1 pokemon, which is pretty broken imo. Not to mention Sand Veil.

 

[BurningMan]

confirming as BurningManTest

 

[Mr. Corner]

Confirming as mr. corner

 

[franky]

I am JEFFMANGHETTO

Thundurus- I don't know how Thundurus managed to survive many rounds without receiving attention as the most powerful sweeper in the game. Its trolly 111 Speed, high SpA, access to Nasty Plot, coupled with excellent coverage makes it such an invincible sweeper. One would argue that Stealth Rock and priority makes it less broken but its negative impact in the metagame collectively is still completely detrimental; it has the smallest pool of counters to exist in the metagame and is difficult to revenge kill if you're using an offensive team. I think I'd just categorize Thundurus as too easy to use and in retrospect to the past suspect tests, things that get used too easily after x amount of games (i.e Blaziken) tend to be broken.

Garchomp- I'm ignoring the Sand Veil issue right now and people waiting on Rough Skin to be released but this Pokemon has to leave unfortunately. It is an already-stellar Pokemon on its own, but Sand Veil simply pushes it over the edge. I know the community subtly used Brightpowder as a scapegoat to keep Garchomp in the metagame but the popular Substitute+SD set is statistically more effective with Leftovers than Brightpowder. Garchomp an also use many other sets making it scary versatile. This ability makes Garchomp unnecessarily more invincible with its already-high defensive stats for an offensive Pokemon. In the end, this Pokemon takes no skill to use and it looks pathetic when people continuously Substitute until the opponent misses. I do it too but it shouldn't have to be that way.

*I would consider banishing Garchomp for the time being until Rough Skin is released and re-testing him into the round. We could make special exceptions for this right? Everyone wants to keep Garchomp because its actually pretty useful in the metagame without Sand Veil.

 

[Zephyr]

Zephyr as always

 

[Akola]

I am Roxou.

 

[SOMALIA]

Somalia.

Nominating


Garchomp: I won't bother repeating what countless others have said but this thing is one of the most fearsome sweepers in the B/W OU metagame. It's ability just makes it all that much more notorious and the fact that it can just sub up until you miss a move then set up and proceed to sweep your team, especially late game, is just stupid. Not to mention it has great typing and its stats are just..I won't even bother typing further.