Hidden Ability viability for dummies [Part 3 update]

[OrangeManiac]

Hey everyone, I decided to make a beginner friendly guide to new players explaining the competitive impact of each new hidden ability. This will probably be eventually obsolete when it's replaced by an actual competitive guide when tiers settle but for many newer competitive players this time can be a complete mess and it might be difficult to understand which Pokemon had their viability significantly changed and why. The purpose of this guide is to help you understand should you update your Pokemon to have Hidden Ability or not.

 

 

Pidgeot (Big Pecks) - Unviable. Not only is Pidgeot unviable to begin with, Big Pecks is just so incredibly niche ability because very rare moves are even dropping opponent's defense. It is hard to make a case it is even better than Keen Eye or Tangled Feet, even if you happen to be a Pidgeot fan.

 

Nidoking and Nidoqueen (Sheer Force) - Absolutely role defining. If you paid any attention, you might have noticed that Nidoking jumped all the way from Untiered to OU/BL and Nidoqueen jumped from NU to UU and had its main role completely change. It is because Sheer Force is one of the best offensive abilities in the game, because getting that power boost over secondary effects is so useful. Nidos' movepools are also amazing and so many of its attacks have a secondary effect so they get boosted by Sheer Force.

 

Crobat (Infiltrator) - An upgrade to Inner Focus for most sets in Singles, a downgrade to Inner Focus in Doubles. Having accessibility to hit through Substitutes and Screens is a great safety net to prevent getting completely swept by either a Substitute set up spammer or Screens Hyper offensive team and is often more valuable in singles than not getting flinched or not get Intimidated (as Crobat is already very fast and there isn't that many Intimidate Pokemon in Singles tiers). In Doubles, Intimidate and Fake Out is very common so Inner Focus remains supreme.

 

Persian (Unnerve) - Unviable. A downgrade to Technician even if you happened to love this cat.

 

Arcanine (Justified) - Unviable in Singles, has a very niche strategy in Doubles where you use your teammate to Beat Up Justified Pokemon to gain quick attack boosts.

 

Rapidash (Flame Body) - Unless you play some very unorthodox defensive Rapidash set, Flash Fire is definitely superior to Flame Body on Rapidash which already is quite unviable in any tier.

 

Magneton/Magnezone (Analytic) - Unviable. Magnezone and Magneton are about trapping, so you shouldn't drop Magnet Pull. Even if you wanted to pull off a weird gimmick, even Sturdy is better at that.

 

Pinsir (Moxie) - Nice ability for Pinsir on a Choice Scarf set, which potentially could allow some late-game sweeps when HP gets low. In other sets, Mold Breaker is arguably better.

 

Ditto (Impostor) - I don't probably need to spell this one out.

 

Quagsire (Unaware) - Unaware made Quagsire potentially viable even in higher tiers to serve as a counter to physical set up sweepers by ignoring their boosts, which is nice.

 

Qwilfish (Intimidate) - This hidden ability boosted Qwilfish physically defensive set in NU because Intimidate allows Qwilfish to switch in much easier against physical threats. Swift Swim still remains viable in low tier rain teams.

 

Mantine (Water Veil) - Unviable. Rain sweeper Mantine should use Swift Swim and defensive Mantine should use Water Absorb.

 

Breloom (Technician) - Very useful in some aggressive sets that focus on doing maximum damage with Mach Punch and Bullet Seed. For SubPunching, Poison Heal with Toxic Orb still remains useful.

 

Sableye (Prankster) - Boosted Sableye's viability by A LOT in both Singles and Doubles. Having access to priority Will-o-Wisp, Recover and Taunt makes Sableye a very menacing wall in Singles. In Doubles, thanks to Prankster Sableye can be a very disruptive Pokemon by Will-o-Wisping physical attackers before they can attack, Tricking unwanted items on opponents, using Quash to force opponent's certain Pokemon to attack last, set up priority Sunny Day/Rain Dance, etc.

 

Aggron (Heavy Metal) - Unviable. While technically Heavy Slam should do more damage with it now on average, still heavily inferior to Aggron's previous amazing abilities Rock Head and Sturdy.

 

Roserade (Technician) - Very strong for offensive variants of Roserade by effectively boosting the power of Hidden Power from 60 to 90.

 

Crawdaunt (Adaptability) - Absolutely game-defining. Changed Crawdaunt from absolute uselessness to one of the most powerful wallbreakers in the game.

 

Staraptor (Reckless) - Improved Staraptor's Singles viability a lot by boosting the power of Brave Bird and Double-Edge from Staraptor and thus bumped it to OU/BL. In Doubles, inferior to Intimidate because Intimidate is one of the best abilities of Doubles. (Although Staraptor was quite mediocre in Doubles to begin with)

 

Luxray (Guts) - Luxray used to be quite meh even in the lowest tier of NU but Guts gave it some potential to do something in there. Guts with Flame Orb is a very powerful strategy and Luxray definitely has the attack stat to start doing some heavy damage to its opponents. So ability is Pokemon-defining but can't guarantee it will be any great, even in NU.

 

Floatzel (Water Veil) - In case you are using a physical Floatzel in a team that does not have rain set up, having protection from burn can be okay. But Floatzel is quite awful to begin with - the only reason before to use it was to have it in low tier Rain team with Swift Swim so in that sense, you shouldn't even use Floatzel outside of rain team to begin with. Technically can be useful but practically unviable.

 

Lucario (Justified) - Same as Arcanine, in Doubles has a gimmick strategy where you use Beat Up on your own Pokemon to boost its attack heavily. Potentially strong strategy but very difficult to pull off and thus unreliable. In singles, inferior to Inner Focus.

 

Watchog (Analytic) - Well, it is an update from Watchog's previous abilities (Illuminate and Keen Eye, both of which are some of the most useless abilities in the game). But Watchog is absolutely awful.

 

Musharna (Telepathy) - Useful in a Doubles team that has lots of teammates that have attacks that target all the Pokemon on the field (such as Earthquake, Explosion, Surf, etc.)

 

 

Will be updated as more HAs come.

 

Edited October 22, 2022 by OrangeManiac

[RysPicz]

Throw in the HAs that were released during the previous Anniversary parts maybe? (Lightning Rod Pika/ Raichu, Unaware/ Friend Guard Clefs, Eeveelutions, Starters) 🙂

[OrangeManiac]

1 minute ago, RysPicz said:

Throw in the HAs that were released during the previous Anniversary parts maybe? (Lightning Rod Pika/ Raichu, Unaware/ Friend Guard Clefs, Eeveelutions, Starters) 🙂

Honestly sure, why not. I thought people had learnt how they work by now but it wouldn't hurt to add them.

[TohnR]

Useful post but you're defaming Analytics Magneton ... 😞 It really is a useful ability even tho the other 2 are also useful in their own ways

[OrangeManiac]

1 hour ago, TohnR said:

Useful post but you're defaming Analytics Magneton ... 😞 It really is a useful ability even tho the other 2 are also useful in their own ways

Interesting, could you elaborate on this?

[TohnR]

1 hour ago, OrangeManiac said:

Interesting, could you elaborate on this?

Sure, Analytics give Specs Magneton enough wallbreaking capabilities to be considered in UU/NU with a choice specs.
That is mainly due to the fact that if the opponent is switching out it will trigger Analytics damage boost.
Here are some of the damage output I have considered for UU, but the point stands for NU and is actually amplified there. (Note : Hidden Power Ground would be prefered for NU)

First let's look at the volt blockers with viability :

252+ SpA Choice Specs Analytic Magneton Flash Cannon vs. 252 HP / 236+ SpD Flygon: 117-138 (62.5 - 73.7%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery

252+ SpA Choice Specs Analytic Magneton Flash Cannon vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Flygon: 165-195 (106.4 - 125.8%) -- guaranteed OHKO

252+ SpA Choice Specs Analytic Magneton Flash Cannon vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Solid Rock Rhyperior: 213-252 (95.9 - 113.5%) -- 75% chance to OHKO

252+ SpA Choice Specs Analytic Magneton Flash Cannon vs. 220 HP / 196+ SpD Nidoqueen: 117-138 (60.6 - 71.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Black Sludge recovery

252+ SpA Choice Specs Analytic Magneton Flash Cannon vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Nidoqueen: 157-186 (95.1 - 112.7%) -- 75% chance to OHKO

252+ SpA Choice Specs Analytic Magneton Flash Cannon vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Donphan: 207-244 (105 - 123.8%) -- guaranteed OHKO

252+ SpA Choice Specs Analytic Magneton Hidden Power Grass vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Swampert: 216-256 (104.3 - 123.6%) -- guaranteed OHKO

252+ SpA Choice Specs Analytic Magneton Hidden Power Grass vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Gastrodon: 228-272 (104.5 - 124.7%) -- guaranteed OHKO

252+ SpA Choice Specs Analytic Magneton Hidden Power Grass vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Mamoswine: 208-246 (112.4 - 132.9%) -- guaranteed OHKO

252+ SpA Choice Specs Analytic Magneton Hidden Power Grass (or Flash Canon) vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Krookodile: 182-216 (107 - 127%) -- guaranteed OHKO

Now let's look at mons that cannot prevent momentum but that would want to wall Magneton : 

252+ SpA Choice Specs Analytic Magneton Thunderbolt vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Umbreon: 93-111 (46 - 54.9%)

252+ SpA Choice Specs Analytic Magneton Thunderbolt vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Snorlax: 105-124 (39.3 - 46.4%)

252+ SpA Choice Specs Analytic Magneton Flash Cannon vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Gigalith in Sand: 152-182 (79.1 - 94.7%)

252+ SpA Choice Specs Analytic Magneton Thunderbolt vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Eviolite Dusclops: 63-75 (42.8 - 51%)

252+ SpA Choice Specs Analytic Magneton Thunderbolt vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Rotom-Heat: 73-87 (46.4 - 55.4%)

252+ SpA Choice Specs Analytic Magneton Flash Cannon vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Rotom-Mow: 65-77 (52 - 61.6%)

252+ SpA Choice Specs Analytic Magneton Thunderbolt vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Clefable: 120-142 (59.4 - 70.2%)

252+ SpA Choice Specs Analytic Magneton Thunderbolt vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Assault Vest Machamp: 118-141 (59.8 - 71.5%)

252+ SpA Choice Specs Analytic Magneton Thunderbolt vs. 252 HP / 252+ SpD Bronzong: 102-121 (58.6 - 69.5%)

 

Now let's see Magneton damage output against offensive Pokemon known for having a decent special bulk :

252+ SpA Choice Specs Analytic Magneton Flash Cannon vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Roserade: 132-156 (97.7 - 115.5%) -- 87.5% chance to OHKO

252+ SpA Choice Specs Analytic Magneton Thunderbolt vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Mismagius: 148-175 (109.6 - 129.6%) -- guaranteed OHKO

252+ SpA Choice Specs Analytic Magneton Thunderbolt vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Heracross: 162-192 (104.5 - 123.8%) -- guaranteed OHKO

252+ SpA Choice Specs Analytic Magneton Thunderbolt vs. 252 HP / 0 SpD Spiritomb: 145-172 (92.3 - 109.5%) -- 56.3% chance to OHKO

252+ SpA Choice Specs Analytic Magneton Thunderbolt vs. 252 HP / 164+ SpD Scrafty: 109-130 (63.3 - 75.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

 

I will not mention pokemon such as Feraligatr, Crawdaunt, Slowbro, Yanmega, Sigilyph, Durant, Vaporeon, Crobat, Mandibuzz, Poliwrath which Magneton has a natural advantage against and that aren't expected to be able to live a Specs hit anyways.
As you can see Magneton is literally one of those mons that always comes out with a kill or momentum if it clicks the right move, which means it has viability as a wallbreaker that can pivot. Of course it doesn't have the best defensive stats and speed but it does have a typing that lets him come on a variety of walls and a few choice locked attackers (for instance it claims a kill if Krook locks in Crunch).
Umbreon, Dusclops and Snorlax can wall Magneton but cannot really damage it while being forced into a recovery loop that just gives free momentum

Obviously I did not put calcs for Magneton specs without Analytics here because it wouldn't be viable, as it misses most of the OHKOs mentionned here
The most basic example would be against the most used Volt Blocker : 252+ SpA Choice Specs Magneton Flash Cannon vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Flygon: 127-150 (81.9 - 96.7%)

Edited October 22, 2022 by TohnR

[OrangeManiac]

Alright I will edit OP to say Analytics Magneton has a wallbreaking niche.

[LifeStyleNORE]

yeah Analytics Volt Switch is dope. Also Sableye I feel you are overrating it in singles, all you need to shut it down completely is to just switch in a dark-type. Its stats are also pretty terrible like it can't really switch into strong hits. 

[OrangeManiac]

1 hour ago, LifeStyleNORE said:

yeah Analytics Volt Switch is dope. Also Sableye I feel you are overrating it in singles, all you need to shut it down completely is to just switch in a dark-type. Its stats are also pretty terrible like it can't really switch into strong hits. 

I mean, it already was decent in NU without Prankster and now switches in on physical attackers far better because it has priority Wisp available. I personally don't think it should be rated higher than NU but I can see it being very solid physical wall at least in NU environment, maybe I should have specified that but I heard there was some speculation Sableye could become UU (and it did until it was revised and sent back to NU).

 

Edit: Or was that just a temporary Prankster ban until TC decided what to do, I cant remember

 

Edited October 22, 2022 by OrangeManiac

[LifeStyleNORE]

11 hours ago, OrangeManiac said:

I mean, it already was decent in NU without Prankster and now switches in on physical attackers far better because it has priority Wisp available. I personally don't think it should be rated higher than NU but I can see it being very solid physical wall at least in NU environment, maybe I should have specified that but I heard there was some speculation Sableye could become UU (and it did until it was revised and sent back to NU).

 

Edit: Or was that just a temporary Prankster ban until TC decided what to do, I cant remember

 

I read something like "very menacing wall" that's why I thought you overhyped it. Nerfed Prankster is pretty ass in a tier where Dark-Type is one of the most viable and they just come in for free, so I think it's worth mentioning that flaw.