[SM] CAP Metagame Discussion

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Here's a post in OU about the distinction between Gren and Ash-Gren, especially in the case of a suspect. I don't think it's official, but it seems logical enough and it's from a mod after all. On a similar note, what do people think about the difference between Gren in OU and Gren in CAP? Is there anything in CAP that makes it more or less banworthy?
 

G-Luke

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Building off Kyubics post, what happens when a mon thats broken / suspectworthy in OU but is not in CAP?

Do we still kick it to remain consistent with OU even though its ok / healthy in our metagame, or do we pull a Monotype and have our own banlist?
 

cbrevan

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The CAP metagame follows OU's banlist, so anything that is banned in OU is banned here regardless of how it actually performs in CAP. In fact, the only way for a Pokemon to be banned from the CAP metagame is through an OU suspect test and ban.
 

BP

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Mega Metagross being banned now changes everything. A bunch of things are about to shift, and this goes triple if Protean Greninja is the next Suspect, like everyone expects.
Reach is so right things are a lot different now. This didn't even happen in ORAS. The metagame is going to completely shift.
 

HeaLnDeaL

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I don't have time for a big post so I'll keep this short. While I certainly don't think nothing is going to change, I don't think there's going to be a landslide of changes in the CAP metagame. Mega Metagross was not the same metagame defining force in CAP that it was in OU. I think a few things might get more viable now but it's not like it's a brand new meta.

If you want a brand new meta, wait for CAP updates and Triage Rev ._.
 

SHSP

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eh, as much as Gross wasn't the defining force in CAP, it was still one of the top 3 or so megas in the format. With it being gone, it's gonna shake up a lot just based off of teams having freedom to run megas that were outclassed or beaten by Gross, combined with upcoming updates and possible other OU suspects/bans this meta is about to basically be revamped in a lot of ways, really looking forward to a bunch of new stuff
 
It's also going to be interesting from a building standpoint. MGross had amazing splashability. You have some amazing offense with MMaw now, but you lack the speed. You have the speed and offense with Kartana, but you lack the bulk. So in teambuilding terms, MMetaBan has shaken up how we build and how we prep, simultaneously allowing more possibilities as it takes its death grip off of the Pokemon it checks, but also getting rid of one of the most splashable megas. Only time will tell how its going to go.
 

Drapionswing

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It's also going to be interesting from a building standpoint. MGross had amazing splashability. You have some amazing offense with MMaw now, but you lack the speed. You have the speed and offense with Kartana, but you lack the bulk. So in teambuilding terms, MMetaBan has shaken up how we build and how we prep, simultaneously allowing more possibilities as it takes its death grip off of the Pokemon it checks, but also getting rid of one of the most splashable megas. Only time will tell how its going to go.
This sums up how metagross is going to affect things here, while it wasn't AS broken here(still broken in my opinion) it warped teambuilding and forced teams to run Pyroak and Scizor a lot. It was also a go to check for things like Crucibelle on offensive teams which I now think is going to be a top Mega. Scizor and Cyclohm lost a huge purpose and I think will fall off now that Metagross is gone, SD Scizor is checked by a bunch of pokemon and as the meta can now free up resources to check greninja such as Celesteela, Mollux or Toxapex all of which check scizor. Mega metagross being gone means that cyclohm really just isn't as good now, ground types are all over this metagame and despite Cyclohm having access to ice beam they still pressure it immensely. The meta is also more specially inclined and fairies such as Magearna and Tapu Lele just got a hell of a lot better. Not to mention Latios who is probably going to be making an impact now that metagross is gone and it has that key ground immunity.
 

reachzero

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I thought DrapionSwing has a good finger on the pulse of Mega Metagross's metagame impact. Although we had a lot more clear answers, no team could afford to avoid MMetagross, and it made a big difference in evaluating certain Pokemon--Magearna, for instance, had a big handicap in that it couldn't check MMetagross the way Celesteela, Skarmory or Ferrothorn could. I expect non-Scarf Lele to make a big jump as the metagame gets a little slower; Mega Metagross was a major force holding it back.

From a Mega standpoint, I expect this to be a big boost for Mega Scizor, which was already really good, and perhaps even more so for Mega Medicham, since Lele + Medicham just lost a huge check.

The value of Pyroak as a Stealth Rock user takes a big hit when compared to other options with more role compression; it's also a lot harder to accept losing momentum to Heatran,. Zygarde and Mollux since you aren't countering a major threat anymore. In fact, if the Charizards gain usage (which they should), I could see Pyroak taking a big hit in viability.

Teams will still need Steels, and I expect Heatran and Magearna to be the big winners here. Not checking MMeta was a major strike against each of them, and both do a much better job of checking Lele than the other Steels.

All of this to say, MMeta impacted a ton of team building decisions, and was a major influence on the speed of the metagame. Base 100s should become significantly more common, and I would expect a strong trickle effect. MMetagross may not have been broken in CAP (Protean Greninja though...), but it had incredible metagame influence.

Edit: I forgot to mention that Crucibelle usage will probably go through the roof now.
 
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HeaLnDeaL

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I mean yeah megagross was great, but there's a whole row of other steel types that were already almost as great ready to shine and be just a be a bit better. So, in that regard I very much agree with reachzero. The disagreement is just that I don't think it's cause for a massive shake up in viability per se. I largely see this as a usage percentage shift, not a big VR shift (because the mons who are going to raise due to gross being gone were already fairly highly ranked in VR). For example, mega scizor had less than half the usage of megagross, but is (was?) only one rank lower in the VR. Magearna had similar usage to Mega Scizor (though I suspect it was actually higher over the last month in which usage stats are not available) and is A rank as well.

Overall, I'm just not seeing major shifts in Viability Ranks. Some things are very likely to raise a single step in ranking, but it's not like the metagame is going to be drastically different. Usage trends might be a bit more tumultuous than VR at first, but I really don't think Gross leaving will create a gaping whole in teambuilding or whatnot. Reach mentions a decrease in scarf Lele, but from my observations of both CAP and OU, spoon and specs Lele were already on the rise well before the ban.

My own personal musing will be that Crucibelle + Lele cores will be more fearsome now, but this is kinda just theorymoning (much like most of everything in this thread regarding the post ban meta)... but at least Celesteela still exists.

TL;DR: Usage will be impacted (kinda hard for it not to be when we lose a 20% mon), but I doubt we'll see many VR shifts beyond a single step. I don't think anyone who played before the ban will have any trouble adapting to the current metagame and I don't think teams without megagross from before the ban era will suddenly have to be massively reworked. This is going to look like a really small change when compared to the impending CAP updates.
 

cbrevan

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I think the Mega Metagross ban will have a large impact on teambuilding, mainly because the metagame is losing one of most splashable and threatening Pokemon in the tier. Even if there are other Steel-types waiting to fill its gap, I feel like we can safely say none of them were as threatening as Metagross was, especially in it's ability to power through many of its softer checks. Mega Scizor, Magearna, and the like simply can't boast the same presence Metagross was able to in that it was a fast coverage monster; it's presence in the metagame put a lot of pressure on Pokemon such as Keldeo and the Latis to really prove their worth. Some predictions I have is a drop in Pyroak usage as people turn to Mega Mega Medicham and other powerhouse megas that Pyroak doesn't answer efficiently, but I also believe Pyroak will retain a lot of its usage owing to the fact that it checks the standard four attacks Mega Mawile set very well. I'm sure Mega Crucibelle will see a raise in usage, but I doubt it'll be a massive spike due to the fact that Landorus-T and Zygarde aren't going to be affected adversely by the drop, in fact, I'd be willing to bet that both Pokemon see even more usage due to their ability to check Mega Scizor/Magearna without having to run another Steel-type check specifically for Ice Punch Metagross. In the long run, I can't really say how the metagame will shape out. What's most likely to happen is that the metagame will start to settle for a couple weeks and then be put right on it's head again when the updates hit, at which points we'll see such oddities like Voodoom being taken seriously and people using Revenankh. Overall, we're going to be in for a very interesting month or so.
 

HeaLnDeaL

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While I don't want to really discuss the state of OU, I think it's fair to argue that BP was incredibly less broken in CAP than OU. Homohawk obviously is a factor in this. Two of the major BP recipients in OU, Necrozma and Magearna, face different obstacles in CAP as well. Being unable to touch a dark type that has 30%+ usage on CAP teams really hurts Necrozma. Magearna has different paths for destruction in CAP and is far more often used on TR or TW (or just generic offense teams) than it is used on BP.

One of the hot topics in the ban was whether or not dry passing even deserved to be preserved. However, many of the arguments relied on stating that only 2 or so low B or C ranked mons in OU were even worth dry passing with. Once again, in CAP this is different, as god Tomohawk itself was a very capable dry passer. As such, dry passing or even just sub passing were almost just as common in CAP as a stat pass. However, banning a potentially annoying move on Tomohawk certainly isn't an "unfair" side effect, and BPless Tomohawk is still going to be a big deal.

All in all, this decision really won't impact much in CAP since stat passing here was never as big of a problem. I'm sure we can remember the beginning on the sumo metagame when spark got an idk 60 killstreak using batonpass, but things have changed a lot since then.

I think, in CAP at least, that the two "biggest" offenders were Pokemon rather than the move; Scolipede (the best passer) and Magearna (one of the best recipients; I don't think Necrozma is as effective in CAP than OU since Duggy can't muscle past Colossoil as easily as it can other Dark-types).

So many of the pro-arguments revolved around avoiding complex bans and just banning the problem itself, which makes me wonder why the thought of banning Scolipede itself really wasn't discussed. How likely would it be that Mew or whatever else could be as effective at passing as Scolipede? Scolipede was easily the most splashable passer. People talked about having complete bans and brought up things like banning Blaziken rather than banning speed boost on Blaziken. The result we got here with Baton Pass is somewhat hodgepodge though when looking at a one-for-one scenarior... rather than banning the broken mon, we banned its broken element. Of course, it's definitely true that other mons have access to this element and that (stat) passing was a destructive force... We've been dealing with baton pass bans for a long, long time, and many of the problems had nothing to do with Scolipede. And what has happened when we've banned the previous broken BPers? Shellsmashers like Gorebyss became unusable in OU, chains became unusable, etc. And still, despite all this, Baton Pass became an effective force in OU and would not go away. Would banning the most splashable passer, Scolipede, have solved the problem or at least significantly reduced it? Maybe. But the chosen path of action definitely solved the problem for OU.

Honestly, minus the part where we literally don't have a banlist of our own, this whole event has made me extremely proud to be a CAPper. We have established our own little metagame that I believe doesn't have nearly as many problems as OU has had this generation or even last. We have a largely stable, fun metagame that is balanced because of our own creations, many of them happenstancely created with no intention of them interacting with each other. We solved the plague of baton pass with a priority hazer, we solved the wrath of Megagross with solid bulk from mons like Cyclohm. And who knows, if we keep building for our own metagame, we can making keep solving problems rather than creating them.

Now, I'm honestly unsure how some of our impending updates will play out... maybe we've ruined some of the stability by shaking the tree too much. I have greatly treasured our old metagame's resilience through the ages and I'm curious to see if we can keep it going.
 

Funbot28

Banned deucer.
Honestly, this further makes me question if we really should keep following the OU banlist. More and more of their decisions (ie: Mega Gross and BP) do not translate to the same level of brokenness as in the CAP metagame, or at least enough to warrant a ban. Ik this might be a PR issue, but I really wanted to at least bring up the discussion.

I'm indifferent either way, just curious on other thoughts.
 
Honestly Broken Phobias I was half heartedly joking but I wouldn't be against a CAP Council and having our own ban list... it would make a lot more sense to have the top CAP players and minds figuring out what is broken and ban worthy in our tier. Instead of those OU goobers who wouldn't even acknowledge us as another more than the dysfunctional step child... but I digress this has been brought up multiple times and every time the answer remains unchanged.

To stay on topic though I think the BP ban wouldn't really affect cap at all, it was something that you didn't really see other than to meme friends or by lower tier players, and it could be easily played around imo. Tomohawk was the only thing that sometimes ran BP outside of fully dedicated BP teams and thats rarely seen and was more a thing in previous gens. So in conclusions while its a ban and those usually bring about drastic change this one does relatively nothing for our metagame.
 
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reachzero

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I could not possibly disagree more with HeaL on this issue.

Baton Pass was one of the last bastions of truly uncompetitive play remaining, one of the few examples where team matchup could still outright decide the outcome of the game, plain and simple. It was completely possible to have Haze Tomohawk and still lose to BP considering the ease of running recipients like Hoopa-U or Tapu Lele, and the cost of covering BP teams in team building is pretty high. Yes, you are at a disadvantage bringing a BP team against the possibility of Haze Tomohawk or Whirlwind Skarmory, but you have a massive advantage if your opponent doesn't have one--and this is talking only about Scolipede, without even accounting for Mew.

Regarding complex bans, we bent over backwards already to try to conserve Baton Pass, and we ended up with issue after issue. After seeing the utter disaster that was BW OU, I've totally soured on complex bans.

In terms of separate tiering, I feel that would totally unmoor us from OU, and would require a massive project unto itself (is Darkrai Uber in CAP? Is Moody?)
 

HeaLnDeaL

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How could you possibly not disagree with me more when my post actually agreed with you in the first place reachzero? I said myself that I thought that Baton Pass ban worked to solve the issue. If you're disagreeing with me, then you didn't even bother to read my post in the first place. I talked about the possibility of alternative bans, but I did not personally support them and I did personally support the full baton ban.

But, you know, since this is actually the CAP metagame thread I actually talked about the CAP metagame too.

#pointlesscalloutsthanksbro

But the chosen path of action definitely solved the problem for OU.
But the chosen path of action definitely solved the problem for OU.
But the chosen path of action definitely solved the problem.
 

Deck Knight

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Since it was brought up, the issue for me on separate tiering is one of manpower and dedication. Our metagame would be even more stable if we weren't tied in to every OU ban that happens. However I would also say that CAP would have to have an inherently different tiering philosophy to remain true to our principles. We fix the metagame by addition, not subtraction, and we only "fix" it if that outcome is considered desirable enough in the context of a new CAP Project. If our project is to add a Triage Nasty Plot Oblivion Wing (Concept: Stat-Up that Rocks the Hawk) sweeper* to end Hazehawk's reign as "stops all stat-up mons," then we shouldn't try to build such a mon so it doesn't also roll over Cyclohm or Mega Crucibelle.


All of this independent tiering talk is really a separate question suitable for a Policy Review Thread more than a metagame discussion though.

*Hypothetical CAP is NOT a real suggestion
 

reachzero

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With Updates on the cusp of completion, I thought it would be fun if we made some predictions about how we expect things to change.

Big Winners

Naviathan: Flame Orb Dragon Dance Naviathan is suddenly the most dangerous set-up sweeper in the entire metagame. Being at a consistent +1 means it has the luxury of attacking without boosting to weaken its checks, then DD and sweep later.

Arghonaut: Spikes and Circle Throw finally give it something to do besides sit there, which suddenly makes it a great answer to Volkraken, Battle Bond Greninja and Syclant, some of the most threatening offensive Pokemon in CAP.

Clefable: Revenankh counter? Check. Hard check to Arghonaut? Check. Already super useful against Zygarde, Clefable handles several of the updates CAPs admirably, while potentially luring Naviathan and Crucibelle into Thunder Wave. SM CAP has not been kind to Clefable so far, but the updates give it a good boost.

Revenankh: Probably not as threatening as some people seem to think, but a good revenge killer with outstanding lure potential. One of the major forces that will keep Naviathan in check. Worlds better than pre-update.

Tapu Koko: a good check to Revenankh, Voodoom and Arghonaut, Koko benefits the most from the fact that it now switches far more freely into Tomohawk, making it pretty significantly spammable. Also really likes having Spikes, which will be a lot easier to get and keep up now.

Cawmodore: Perhaps a surprising choice considering it wasn't directly buffed, but the other metagame shifts should be very friendly to Caw. Naviathan puts a major stress on the base 95 Scarf users, which are the best and most reliable answers to Naviathan (Scarf Volkraken and Lele). The Scarf users that are better against Naviathan are worse against Cawmodore (Crucibelle, Plasmanta, Garchomp), and Keldeo, which works well against both, has issues with Arghonaut. Naviathan and Cawmodore have fantastic synergy now.

Mega Pinsir: A lot of the updates are boosting Fighting types, and Mega Pinsir is gaining popularity now anyway. A sweeper not stopped by Tomohawk or Arghonaut is always great, but things have really lined up well for Pinsir.


Big Losers

Volkraken: Arghonaut and Naviathan are major strikes against Volkraken, one of the premier offensive threats right now.

Battle Bond Greninja: Arghonaut and Revenankh make it a lot harder for Ash-Greninja to do what it does best, all the more so because Triage Drain Punch out prioritizes Water Shuriken. Protean will be pretty significantly better.

Tomohawk: Aside from the direct nerfs, Naviathan and Voodoom are new sweepers that can beat Tomohawk, and several other metagame shifts look to be very threatening for it.

Syclant: More Arghonaut and perhaps more Tapu Koko would be very bad signs for Syclant, and Reve


Playstyle Shifts

Several updates directly impacted the value of hazards in the CAP metagame, and more hazard generally plays in favor of faster-paced offense against bulky offense and balanced. Rapid Spin has been extremely easy to fit and execute in CAP for a long time, but the updates promise more and better Ghosts even as Spikes Arghonaut becomes a factor. This means Defog will become significantly more valuable in proportion to Rapid Spin. I don't think these updates affect the viability of stall much either way, though stall seems extremely underrepresented in the CAP metagame considering how effective it is.

What changes and shifts do you expect to see?
 

Deck Knight

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Colossoil really hates the buffs to Rev, Argho, and Naviathan, and won't really like more impactful Tapu Koko or Mega Pinsir either. Naviathan now competes with Soil as a status absorber as well. It is probably the biggest, tallest, darkest loser.

I wouldn't underestimate defensive Revenankh either - Will-O-Wisp is a great tool for any bulky Pokemon to have at its disposal, especially when Rev can choose between Shed Skin to help absorb status or Triage Moonlight to recover off big hits it might incur on the Wisp turn.
 
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