Metagame SV OU Metagame Discussion v3

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njnp

We don't play this game to lose.
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With the removal of Roaring Moon from the tier, we hopefully as a community will turn our attention to the biggest problem in the tier, Hazard Control. When the latest survey is upon us I feel it's best to focus on efforts to remove Gliscor from the tier and then turn our attention to Gholdengo. We will need a high score on Gliscor for it to be up for a quick ban vote, I hope we can tackle this issue as soon as possible. Some of you may feel Gholdengo is the main problem with hazards and not Gliscor. Some of you may feel Gholdengo is not the problem and Gliscor is. We are all aligned on the fact that hazard control is the problem though. Personally, I find Gholdengo to be very overbearing for balance to handle as a set-up sweeper, especially with the presence of Tera. I have felt this way for a while but with the removal of a nice check in Roaring Moon, I can only see it getting even better.

I won't make this post long-winded, because I've already covered this important issue in previous posts. The fact of the matter is that Gholdengo got a 3.11 from qualified users, and Gliscor got a 3.39. Gliscor has a much better shot if this trend continues next survey in receiving enough support to be quick banned rather than Gholdengo. All players who believe Hazard Control is the biggest issue in the tier I encourage you to vote a high score 4/5 on Gliscor along with Gholdengo so we hopefully quick ban Gliscor and then suspect Gholdengo to make our best time-efficient effort into tackling the Hazard Control problem.
 
This is a fair point yeah, Corviknight can mostly ignore whatever Gliscor throws at it... but the same can be said for Gliscor. what's Corv going to do even if it can run defog? It can't hurt Gliscor back. And even if Corv defogs, Gliscor gets so much entry points as others have mentioned - it's immune to spikes, only takes 12% from rocks, takes negligible damage from chip dmg coming from defensive mons / resisted hits and is a status absorber. It can continuously set up spikes if it wants.

Basically, yes Corv can defog the spikes. Against most spikers that's fine, as they usually lack reliable recovery (Ting Lu, HSam), are frail and can't set up multiple times throughout a match (Meow, Greninja, HSam) or are very passive outside of setting spikes (Clodsire). These traits mean that Corv user can win the war on spikes via positioning and pressuring the spiker.

Gliscor, however, is much, much more resilient than any other spike user we have. There's a reason almost nobody is running other spikers right now.

Also I'm not saying or arguing that Gholdengo is fine, I am in the anti-Ghold camp, but imo Gliscor would be a big, likely overbearing presence regardless of Dengo
I disagree. While Corviknight can't do much to Gliscor, it limits Glisc to one layer of spikes and slow pivots to allow something that can threaten Gliscor get in safely without fear of getting crippled, which will absolutely make it less oppressive, even if it's still a problem.
 
I encourage you to vote a high score 4/5 on Gliscor along with Gholdengo so we hopefully quick ban Gliscor and then suspect Gholdengo to make our best time-efficient effort into tackling the Hazard Control problem.
You wanna ban the symptom of the problem instead of the actual problem itself first? Come tf on already, enough with this. Even if that happens you know people are gonna start with the “Ceaseless Edge is brainless” and “Ting-Lu never dies” complaints again and you’ll have Samurott-H appearing on a survey a second time. Even though Gholdengo is the thing making those Spikes setters so hard to deal with in the first place due to cementing their hazards onto the field just by existing.

I don’t even wanna imagine how people are gonna be reacting if Ferrothorn comes back with Gholdengo still in the tier. “It’s too durable to kill”, “It can run an Iron Defense set to offensively bowl over things while never dying”, “Corviknight can’t counter it and it can Tera to hard-check Great Tusk while still setting Spikes, ban it!”
 
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njnp

We don't play this game to lose.
is a Forum Moderatoris a Community Contributoris a Tiering Contributor
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You wanna ban the symptom of the problem instead of the actual problem itself first? Come tf on already, enough with this. Even if that happens you know people are gonna start with the “Ceaseless Edge is brainless” and “Ting-Lu never dies” complaints again and you’ll have Samurott-H appearing on a survey again. Even though Gholdengo is the thing making those Spikes setters so hard to deal with in the first place due to cementing their hazards onto the field just by existing.
The fact of the matter is majority of the player base finds Gliscor more problematic than Gholdengo, and rightfully so it's a hazard stacker that is not an easy process to wear down compared to Ting Lu & Sam-H which have flaws that Gliscor does not. Gliscor was tied for most used Pokemon last week of scl, it's able to set up hazards on most of the meta, and the only playstyle that really is able to punish it well is pure hyper offense and that playstyle doesn't appreciate its earthquake-toxic protect set. Common counterplay like ballon sets from Gholdengo and Heatran aren't safe as it can easily surprise with a common u-turn and pop ur balloon for the elongated match that Gliscor tends to find itself it commonly. Usually, Gliscor is partnered with mons of course that will help it exploit flaws in most structures so no point in being able to 2hko if it never is gonna stay in.

Furthermore, Gliscor doesn't really have a reliable cover-all-counter it generally comes down to your team structure, and because of the hazard filled metagame it has caused it makes those team structures very repetitive as there is so much else to cover. Now, to be fair due to Tera this applies to a couple of mons but Gliscor is currently the worse offender based on how it warps the hazard control metagame, forcing great tusks to run boots/ice spinner, Cinderace not accomplishing much now sending hazards back as most Gliscor teams don't care about hazards being up the way the teams are structured.

Anyway, once again lets not make an argument about which is more egregious lets focus on getting the Pokemon with the most support to the finish line of being banned and then tackle the next one via suspect.
 
Alright we won! No time to rest though. Gotta get that Gliscor suspect up and running next. Very curious how the next survey is gonna look. Personally (after playing a lot of Gliscor balance to get reqs and climb the ladder) I will be voting higher on Glisc and Gholdengo than I did last survey.

Defog blocking aside it’s actually absurdly difficult to deal with Gholdengo for balance with hazards being as prevalent as they are since Ting Lu just doesn’t cut it anymore (and honestly vs Tera never did) and Gambit gets to do it like once if spikes are up. Defensive dengo sets in particular are also underrated in my opinion as they provide a ton of defensive utility on top of wallbreaking, being a late game win con and protecting your hazards.

Nonetheless Gliscor prolly has to leave first though cause that thing is rendering half the tier useless, pushing one of Dengos most prevalent answers in ting lu into uu and forcing our only rapid spinner to run ice coverage while also getting spikes up every game.

It‘s a bit daunting to look at everything that lies ahead of us honestly cause once we solve hazards we‘re going to have to take a long hard look at Wellspring not laying waste upon the tier. And all of that on such a tight schedule as well. I don’t particularly envy the tier leaders rn but am glad they are so committed to the task
 
As someone who likes making teams of no spikes-affected pokemon, I've not felt particularly upset by Gholdengo/Gliscor; I've felt their presence is interesting and creates some fun dynamics in the tier, as long as you have a way to largely ignore hazards.

But then I re-read that statement, and realized that I'm running very specific adaptations so I get to mitigate the prevalence of spikes, and I'm really not sure what I'd do without those adaptations.

I'm not sure if mono-boots as a playstyle is necessarily an unhealthy adaptation - I enjoy the dynamic of finding ways to mitigate the effects of item removal as well as playing around opponent's attempts at that mitigation. There are plenty of interesting and varied pokemon that interact with this concept - pokemon like Torn-T, Ogerpon (both Water and Grass) and Weavile all make for some fun dynamics there. Long games like the infamous Sylveon vs Carkoal replay will happen with this type of team; I don't think this is a problem in of itself, it's simply something that has to be considered.

But this dynamic is pretty much assuming an environment where spikes are omnipresent, and locks me out of effectively using a lot of more item-dependent pokemon like Heatran or Garganacl that I might otherwise be interested in.

I should also acknowledge that plenty of people have had plenty of success running balance/bulky offence teams that aren't boots spam and rely largely on keeping Tusk alive to remove hazards; I don't particularly enjoy playing these teams right now, and it seems like this is not necessarily an unpopular opinion.

I'm still trying to make my mind up on if this is an actually unhealthy thing for the tier, but I believe a quickban for either Gholdengo or Gliscor would be incredibly premature. The hazard meta and the various ways to play around it is a complicated thing that I believe should be discussed in detail in a suspect test, rather than caving to various shouts in various directions.
 
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I disagree. While Corviknight can't do much to Gliscor, it limits Glisc to one layer of spikes and slow pivots to allow something that can threaten Gliscor get in safely without fear of getting crippled, which will absolutely make it less oppressive, even if it's still a problem.
Corv can do this yes, it can slowturn out of Gliscor to a favourable matchup, however I don't really see this situation pop up much, if at all
See the thing is, at least in my head, the Gliscor - Corv dynamic plays out in the following way:

1. Glisc gets in
2. Corv answers whilst Gliscor sets up a spike.
3. Corv now defogs, while Gliscor switches to an answer into Corv (essentially, it gets a basically free switch)
4. Corv either u-turns out, or is forced to switch.

Most of these interactions are positive for the Gliscor user as far as I can theoritically see it. It's obviosuly dependent the gamestate and teamcomps. If a team's only answer to Corviknight is Gliscor, it changes the dynamic, but that doesn't really happen often.

I can very well be wrong, but this is what I think will happen
 
You wanna ban the symptom of the problem instead of the actual problem itself first? Come tf on already, enough with this. Even if that happens you know people are gonna start with the “Ceaseless Edge is brainless” and “Ting-Lu never dies” complaints again and you’ll have Samurott-H appearing on a survey a second time. Even though Gholdengo is the thing making those Spikes setters so hard to deal with in the first place due to cementing their hazards onto the field just by existing.

I don’t even wanna imagine how people are gonna be reacting if Ferrothorn comes back with Gholdengo still in the tier. “It’s too durable to kill”, “It can run an Iron Defense set to offensively bowl over things while never dying”, “Corviknight can’t counter it and it can Tera to hard-check Great Tusk while still setting Spikes, ban it!”
https://replay.pokemonshowdown.com/gen9ou-1977931491

252 SpA Zapdos Hurricane vs. 244 HP / 12 SpD Gliscor: 219-258 (62.2 - 73.2%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Poison Heal

In this 175-turn replay, see if you can count the number of Hurricanes my Gliscor was hit with. In this game, the ladder matched me with a player far more skilled than I, Elo discrepancy was over 200, and I played my Gliscor very recklessly, knowing I could just get my hp back without having to worry. At least 5 times I was able to get back from under 20% to over 90, only once being with wish support. Note also my Gliscor being hit with multiple ice spinners and scalds. I lost this game by underutilizing Toxapex and misplaying Talonflame, as well as never utilizing my Tera, but the extent to which Gliscor was able to hang on and keep replacing removed spikes (which, tusk got at least 5 successful spins off!) in spite of our skill difference and my reckless gameplay is plain absurd. Gholdengo was not on either of our teams.
 
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Alright we won! No time to rest though. Gotta get that Gliscor suspect up and running next. Very curious how the next survey is gonna look. Personally (after playing a lot of Gliscor balance to get reqs and climb the ladder) I will be voting higher on Glisc and Gholdengo than I did last survey.

Defog blocking aside it’s actually absurdly difficult to deal with Gholdengo for balance with hazards being as prevalent as they are since Ting Lu just doesn’t cut it anymore (and honestly vs Tera never did) and Gambit gets to do it like once if spikes are up. Defensive dengo sets in particular are also underrated in my opinion as they provide a ton of defensive utility on top of wallbreaking, being a late game win con and protecting your hazards.

Nonetheless Gliscor prolly has to leave first though cause that thing is rendering half the tier useless, pushing one of Dengos most prevalent answers in ting lu into uu and forcing our only rapid spinner to run ice coverage while also getting spikes up every game.

It‘s a bit daunting to look at everything that lies ahead of us honestly cause once we solve hazards we‘re going to have to take a long hard look at Wellspring not laying waste upon the tier. And all of that on such a tight schedule as well. I don’t particularly envy the tier leaders rn but am glad they are so committed to the task
Thing is though if we got rid of Dengo then we would have Corv as a viable defogger to control hazards and Gliscor can't really do anything to Corv while Corv undoes all the hazards that Gliscor laid out. It would then probably end up in both switching as the Gliscor switches to a mon that can handle Corv and the Corv switches to a mon that can either handle Gliscor or whatever mon is gonna come out to handle itself.
 
Thing is though if we got rid of Dengo then we would have Corv as a viable defogger to control hazards and Gliscor can't really do anything to Corv while Corv undoes all the hazards that Gliscor laid out. It would then probably end up in both switching as the Gliscor switches to a mon that can handle Corv and the Corv switches to a mon that can either handle Gliscor or whatever mon is gonna come out to handle itself.
And then Gliscor comes back out and gets all the spikes back up
 
And Corv comes back out and removes them all again as well.
Corv's healing can be knocked away (by Gliscor) and can run out of PP. neither is the case for Gliscor (save for protect which has double roost's PP,) who now runs U-turn to win the interaction that you're describing
 
Corv's healing can be knocked away (by Gliscor) and can run out of PP. neither is the case for Gliscor (save for protect which has double roost's PP,) who now runs U-turn to win the interaction that you're describing
Corviknight won't immediately collapse just because Gliscor knocked lefties off. I'm willing to bet most Corv would run rocky helmet anyway.
Suuure Glisc might win a long pp stall war that will also cripple itself (Pressure Corv) but in actuality Corviknight U-turns into Weavile and smokes you. I believe both Ghold and Glisc should go but Glisc does not just win the Corv MU
 
Corv does technically win the hazard war thanks to Pre ssure, but what's stopin Taunt variants from popping off
If Gliscor uses Taunt, it's dropping Toxic (I think Protect is close to non-negotiable outside of SD sets), which makes it much easier to switch into or deal with offensively. There is definitely a trade-off to running Taunt.
 
Corv can do this yes, it can slowturn out of Gliscor to a favourable matchup, however I don't really see this situation pop up much, if at all
See the thing is, at least in my head, the Gliscor - Corv dynamic plays out in the following way:

1. Glisc gets in
2. Corv answers whilst Gliscor sets up a spike.
3. Corv now defogs, while Gliscor switches to an answer into Corv (essentially, it gets a basically free switch)
4. Corv either u-turns out, or is forced to switch.

Most of these interactions are positive for the Gliscor user as far as I can theoritically see it. It's obviosuly dependent the gamestate and teamcomps. If a team's only answer to Corviknight is Gliscor, it changes the dynamic, but that doesn't really happen often.

I can very well be wrong, but this is what I think will happen
You might have to let one layer of spikes stay to keep momentum on your side but if Glis spikes twice Corv can defog to reset the position. That would probably be a fair trade.
 
I am relieved that Roaring Moon was banned. It had so little defensive counterplay and could quickly end turns with 1 turn of setup. I personally found it much harder to deal with than Kingambit although I do find Kingambit banworthy still. Teambuilding is definitely freer with Roaring Moon gone.
 

TCTphantom

formerly MX42
Gliscor -> Gholdengo -> Ogerpon -> Zamazenta -> Kingambit ->
Zama wouldn’t even be in the top 10 things on the radar. Just because your HO team got swept doesn’t mean it’s broken. If anything, having more speed control in the meta is good for it rn.

I think everyone agrees hazards gotta take a hit. Ghold and Gliscor together are the problem children. Take one out and focus on the other asap. We could use precedence for DLC2.
 

awyp

'Alexa play Ladyfingers by Herb Alpert'
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I'll make a quick post since we're moving onto the next issue. I genuinely think Gholdengo should be the next mon to be suspected. It is the reason hazard stack is so bad, the only thing is Gliscor has made the issue we've been dealing with for almost a year even worse.

- It's very bulky for what its supposed to be, and can be used for multiple types of roles you can go 252 SpA / 252 Spe and you can go 252 HP / 252 Def and it'll be as dangerous.

- It has Recover which means if you do damage it to try to remove it off the field and have the opportunity to rapid spin / defog it doesn't work because it will just switch out and switch back in on a safe turn and you have to catch it on the switch and hope you get a rapid spin / defog off.

(Insane Type Combination + with the opportunity to Tera)
Weaknesses: Dark, Fire, Ghost, Ground
Resistances: Bug, Dragon, Fairy, Flying, Grass, Ice, Psychic, Rock, Steel
Immunities: Fighting, Normal, Poison, Sandstorm damage, Toxic, Trapping

Base 133 SpA and Make It Rain +2 hits like a damn brick

+2 252+ SpA Tera Steel Gholdengo Make It Rain vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Kingambit: 334-394 (97.9 - 115.5%) -- 87.5% chance to OHKO

I can go further but I just really want to stir the conversation.

 
I don’t get it.

last gen people cry about boots because they can’t play without sneaky pebbles.

this gen, there is 10x fewer knock off Pokemon and basically 0 U-turn styles, and now hazards are the problem? God forbid anyone try to play proactively

I don’t agree with the so-called hazards problem. Tera and overbearing defensive threats are what need to go

oh and the phrase “supposed to” should be banned when discussing the role of a Pokemon. The game just is. You don’t get to pick and choose intent behind what “should” exist
 
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