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[UU Discussion] Lucario


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Posted (edited)

image.png.95eea4e2052a3b069a817de7fcb14f40.png

 

 

Overview:

The current UU tier has had notable changes recently, with the release of the BL banlist back to UU as well as many long-standing OU Pokemon falling in usage and dropping to UU. In this newly established UU metagame, Lucario has come off on top in many different ways. It is sitting on top of UU usage with very notable 36% usage and very respectable 55% winrate. Lucario has many of the traits of a premier sweeper. It is reasonably fast with base 90 speed, has very respectable 110 Atk/115 Sp. Atk for offense and also has access to useful priority moves to punish Pokemon that are faster than Lucario. Lucario has access to a very diverse movepool when needed, albeit Lucario often results doing a lot of its heavy lifting with powerful STAB moves.

Effect to the metagame:
Lucario has already demonstrated it is clearly one of the premiere sweepers in the UU tier. While it is common for some Pokemon becoming clearly the best at their role within a metagame, Lucario has done this to a somewhat worrying extent. Furthermore, countering Lucario has become quite of a problem for newly established UU teambuilders. The clearest and the most concerning part about Lucario's effect in the metagame is unpredictability. It is enormously hard, if not almost impossible, to bring up counters that will counter Lucario regardless of its moveset. Many of the counters to Lucario's physical set will fall to its special set and counters to its special set will have trouble taking on a physical Lucario. The unpredictability of Lucario's build forces countering to rely in cores rather than individual Pokemon, which arguably may put a problematic amount of restraint in UU teambuilding. It must be mentioned that Lucario in a full on hyper offensive sweeper battle might not even be such a valuable Pokemon due to its rather mediocre base speed for a sweeper in UU environment. However, relying on outspeeding Lucario with too many threats while also not taking too much damage from Lucario's priority attacks can also seen as a limiting effect to the metagame.

Checks and counters:

Countering Lucario largely relies on identifying Lucario's build, whether it is physical or special offensive variant. Some of the more common checks and counters are listed below:

 

Mandibuzz (counter to physical variant, also does reasonably well against both sets)

Salamence (checks both variants)

Sableye (counter to physical variant)

Hippowdon (counter to physical variant)

Cofagrigus (check to physical variant)

Tentacruel (counter to special variant)

 

 

Suggestion for ban criterion:

While using Lucario, it may not always feel like Lucario is a Pokemon you can "sweep with little to no effort" because when you are using Lucario, you can feel its limitations because you are only limited to the moveset you are using. However, from the opposing point of view things get a whole lot more difficult because opponent cannot always even guess Lucario's moveset until Lucario has at least attacked them once. Considering Lucario's power, even one powerful attack on an unexpecting opponent may cause unrepairable damage to their board position. While it must be noted that 2/3 of Lucario's are of the physical variant, 1/3 Lucario's being Special is common enough to keep opponent uncertain. Furthermore, Lucario can be countered with cores of multiple Pokemon. An example of this is using a physical defensive Hippowdon to counter physical Lucario and Tentacruel against special offensive Lucario.

 

While Tentacruel and Hippowdon can be recognized as fundamentally solid Pokemon in the current UU tier in general, the Tier Council feels that Lucario may restrict teambuilding a little bit too much due to its unpredictability and to the extent of being detrimental to the UU metagame. Therefore while Tier Council recognizes that Lucario is definitely not far from being potentially even "Offensive Uber Characteristics" in UU tier, it even more notably seems to exert a somewhat unhealthy effect to newly established UU tier.

 

 

Prompt for discussion:

The Tier Council recognizes and understands the current UU metagame is very new and has only existed for a few weeks. Lucario has established itself at the very least a very notable threat and has some traits that can be argued are detrimental to the development of the tier. The Tier Council wants to get your inputs to the topic, such as:

 

- Is Lucario Offensive Uber Chacteristics in your opinion?

- Does Lucario affect teambuilding in an unhealthy manner?

- Or do you feel that Lucario has enough counterplay or can have that counterplay as metagame develops? Or is it too early to tell yet?

 

Keep in mind, just because a discussion thread is opened does not mean a Pokemon necessarily will get banned. We have reached also positive feedback of current UU tier and we respect that. We wanted to open a thread for Lucario because we wanted to get an understanding whether this Pokemon that on the surface looks very problematic actually feels that way for UU players, or whether UU players feel like Lucario is not causing enough problems in UU tier for action to be taken.

 

Please discuss!

 

Edited by OrangeManiac
Posted (edited)

This post explains perfectly the centralization Lucario causes when it comes to defensive mons but it also causes a lot of centralization when it comes to choosing offensive mons when teambuilding, with access to Extreme Speed and Vacuum Wave, once it sets up it can delete a lot of mons or deal a very high amount of damage to them making it a very dangerous sweeper specially in late game,

 

I wouldn't say it's an offensive uber in the tier but I believe it's close to being one, I find it more unhealthy than anything due to the centralization it causes. It deserves the ban.

 

Still not even close to being as banworthy as Staraptor and Togekiss are.

Edited by VadimEmpoleon
Posted

In my mind, i think it is still too early to tell whether it is banworthy.

 

But for sure, it change a lot on how to teambuilding in UU. 

 

We can see many fight type pokemons are no longer be a good choice in UU, because they are not as good as Lucario in this and that aspects (speed, priority moves, mixed offense). Further more, the classic popular UU mon, bisharp are no longer a good choice in UU, due to the Lucario is the hard counter of it.

For these considerations, maybe it is not healthy to the meta diversity.

 

Posted (edited)

Ban. Too strong.

 

You mention mandibuzz as a check...it isnt. 

+2 252+ Atk Life Orb Lucario Close Combat vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Mandibuzz: 183-216 (84.3 - 99.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery (dead after rocks). 

You mention mence as a check, its not. 

+2 252+ Atk Life Orb Lucario Close Combat vs. 244 HP / 244+ Def Salamence: 109-129 (54.2 - 64.1%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

+2 252+ Atk Life Orb Lucario Extreme Speed vs. 244 HP / 244+ Def Salamence: 97-116 (48.2 - 57.7%) -- 94.1% chance to 2HKO

If my math is right, you dont even need to check if the CC damage means you're faster. You just kill with an espeed. 

Any ghost type runs the risk of losing to any +1 mash boosts. 

 

People also forget mach punch for things that resist espeed (im looking at you kabutops). 

 

This is just the physical variant too. While it has a few weaknesses (ground moves, sableye, faster full health mons that can ohko) it's a bit too centralizing for the tier imo.

oh and staraptor and togekiss should get suspected too.

Edited by Scootter
Posted

How in the goddamn hell is this the first thread when Staraptor is destroying everything uncontested? Are we even playing the same tier? Are we even playing?

 

Is it because of Lucario's sheer numbers? Numbers do not dictate brokenness, and they have been thrown around in all sorts of inconsistent ways regardless.

 

"B-but Lucario is unpredictable. You need to know its set to handle it". Sure. The difference is that once you know Staraptor's set, you are still exploding your team and risking predicts that will otherwise also explode if that predict misses. 

 

"B-but there are limited switches to lucario". Good. There are no good switches to Staraptor. 

 

"B-but Lucario has decent 90 base speed". Good. Staraptor has 100

 

"B-but Lucario can set up and kill stuff." Good. Staraptor doesn't need to set up to kill stuff. 

 

This doesn't mean Lucario is not necessarily an issue, in a tier that is no longer a tier anymore. Its a clusterfuck of pandora's boxes holding together a mess. However, I find it extremely laughable how anyone playing this tier can open a Lucario thread before Staraptor when it comes to a potential uber offensive label. 

Posted

Gonna be honest, most of these discussion threads seem like a waste of time. Either the pokemon is so obviously broken that delaying its ban with a discussion thread is nonsensical or the thread is opened, good points are made and nothing ends up happening. 

 

Save yourselves the time and energy and just ban both lucario and staraptor. It does not take a genius to see these pokemon are so stand out in the tier to the point its laughable. You tested them, they were broken, lets move on so we can more closely look at the other BL drops.

Posted
16 hours ago, OrangeManiac said:

Mandibuzz (counter to physical variant, also does reasonably well against both sets)

Salamence (checks both variants)

Sableye (counter to physical variant)

Hippowdon (counter to physical variant)

Cofagrigus (check to physical variant)

Tentacruel (counter to special variant)

Sableye is a counter to the physical variant, but also a check (Flash Cannon Lucario) / fragile counter (dark pulse Lucario) for the special variant as well. Crobat and Gligar are also better than Mandibuzz against Lucario. 

 

I feel Lucario gets to shine a lot since we often see it as a finisher, but most of the time the true stars in those matches are usually the wallbreakers and stallbreakers that did the grunt work that allowed Lucario sweep. 

 

I don't think Lucario restricts teambuilding that much. I have played the tier a lot without any of the mentionned answers and I rarely have to throw away a teambuild because of Lucario. 

 

Imo, the most restrictive mon for teambuilding is Raikou, espcially the Calm Mind, Tbolt, Scald set with either Sub or Rest as a last move. I swear everytime I face a Raikou, I pray it doesn't have a leftovers because that always mean some struggling and avoiding scald burns. Aside from Quagsire Water Absorb and some complex cores, not much can take advantage of that Raikou. I don't think it's banworthy at all, but in terms of "brokeness" it's far superior to Togekiss, Lucario or Staraptor from my point of view.

 

2 hours ago, pachima said:

Are we even playing the same tier? Are we even playing?

Are you playing on an alt or just not at all?

  • Munya pinned and featured this topic
Posted (edited)
25 minutes ago, TohnR said:

What a surprise ! You drop a pokémon that was obviously broken and it turns out obviously broken 😮

Ideas_Surprised_Pikachu_HD.webp.338df55194e2c8cd042d1b077feb5db1.webp

If TC was listening to people like you we would be chain banning everything your fragile mind can't handle. We had already 4 BL mons (Staraptor, Haxorus, Lucario and P2) and you guys were complaing non stop about mons that were currently in UU (Salamence, Blissey, Entei, Cofa, etc.) on top of the mons that were never seen in UU yet (Togekiss and Kabutops). Even if 1 or 2 mons end up banworthy, testing the BL mons and others was worth it.

 

I simply can't understand how someone can act so smug with this "I told you so" attitude when out of the 10+ mons you've been crying wolf about only 1 or 2 or even 0 might actually be banworthy.


edit: If you're right about very little at most and wrong about everything else, the only thing obvious is how much TC should not listen to you and w.e you feel is so obvious.

 

 

Edited by gbwead
Posted (edited)
19 hours ago, LiveLaughHate said:

 

Save yourselves the time and energy and just ban both lucario and staraptor. It does not take a genius to see these pokemon are so stand out in the tier to the point its laughable. You tested them, they were broken, lets move on so we can more closely look at the other BL drops.

What about togekiss tho? It's not Uber offensive/defensive but it is uncompetitive because Air Slash is luck and invalidation-based(Basically a roll(luck) to the opponent be unable to attack at all(invalidation) and you has to use very specific sets to bypass the flinch machine, such as base 80+ with scarf(anything below won't work)), and the speed for UU standards is considerable, even more with the Choice Scarf. Imo should be banned with those 2. 

Edit: Couldn't put this earlier because when i posted i was on school and the internet was s***(Don't worry, i was on Interval, and teachers there cannot take your phone at all so i was able to post without problems.), but here we go: Togekiss has a major difference from UU than OU: The power of the mons around it, which on UU is considerable lower, which makes it's bulk excellent for the tier standards, so taking it off is not as easy as in OU. 

Edited by caioxlive13
Posted

Does Lucario meet Uber criteria? I think it fullfills certain aspects, it has a great offensive and defensive typing, strong priorities and is unpredictable, sth that was also pointed out to be problematic about Salamence but here its worse. Even though i dont think its special set is very scary (after all similar to toxicroak), this unpredictability can force guesses and checking, which can lead to irrevisible damage. It can also vary physical sets like SD fighting gem and OHKO its checks like Hippowdon impish after rocks and one setup. On the bright side its speed stat is base 90, so there is still alot of mons outspeeding it. Overall its the question if you really want a mon, that forces players to build highly specific defensive cores, cause aside from usual UU staples like hippowdon and sableye, what can even wall it? The moment you need more than 1 pokemon to counter another, its time to put it in ubers. Thats why i also think staraptor should go (and entei stay), cause it can often take out more than one mon without setup, which is absurd.

Posted

Lucario is simply an anomaly in the UU metagame. It is an extremely versatile wall breaker which also fits the label of a sweeper under certain circumstances, which threatens even the most common defensive cores in the metagame, when paired with its another equally oppressive partner Staraptor. Despite the number of differentiable teams due to the "Diversity" in the pokemons seen in the metagame, Lucario is an oppressive force that restricts teambuilding which forces the metagame to become centralized by imposing the need for multiple countermeasures to prevent Lucario from creating progress; thus, resulting in the formation of the common cores seen in the metagame such consisting of Sableye paired with either Hippowdon and Tentacruel in bulky offense or Blissey and Quagsire in stall. Its existence forced a shift towards a bulkier metagame which is exploited by Weather teams and offensive teams. Such a transition has not been observed in the former discussion threads for the likes of Entei and Salamence. Not only does Lucario improve matchups for its most popular partner, Staraptor, but it also diminishes the magnitude of the former and soon to be again the prominent threats of the metagame if it happens to get banned. This limits the number of viable defensive cores in the metagame, and it also LIMITS the freedom of players in the teambuilding process to deal with the offensive core of Lucario and Staraptor.

Also, lets not confuse diversity with freedom. It is only reasonable to see unique or uncommon components of cores in the early phase of the meta shift since people were in the process of identifying ways to deal with the brand new threats. People who thinks its too early to make a conclusive decision are just enjoying this abomination of a tier shift despite being aware that its evidently broken based on data and from a logical standpoint. 


 

Posted (edited)
On 10/25/2024 at 3:02 PM, caioxlive13 said:

What about togekiss tho? It's not Uber offensive/defensive but it is uncompetitive because Air Slash is luck and invalidation-based(Basically a roll(luck) to the opponent be unable to attack at all(invalidation) and you has to use very specific sets to bypass the flinch machine, such as base 80+ with scarf(anything below won't work)), and the speed for UU standards is considerable, even more with the Choice Scarf. Imo should be banned with those 2. 

Edit: Couldn't put this earlier because when i posted i was on school and the internet was s***(Don't worry, i was on Interval, and teachers there cannot take your phone at all so i was able to post without problems.), but here we go: Togekiss has a major difference from UU than OU: The power of the mons around it, which on UU is considerable lower, which makes it's bulk excellent for the tier standards, so taking it off is not as easy as in OU. 

my take from a relatively new pvp player so yeah, i'm probably gonna get called noob to say the least, just want to input my grain of salt

 

while yes, in MY total opinion i don't think luck based stuff should be ban worthy, if so, why don't we ban superluck pokemon where they can achieve 100% crit with relative ease in other tiers? if something i'd do a complex ban and ban togekiss + air slash, without that move it should be way more manageable (something similar to sd chomp or dmeteor hydre in ou)

 

 

about lucario I have mixed feelings, it feels like a good breath of air into a tier that was full of walls, but it definetly needs to be kept a close eye on, but for now i don't think it deserves a ban (yet), as someone said in another comment, it comes down to the rest of your team that does the grunt work to allow lucario to go ooga booga (which i dont necessarily think is something good btw)

 

about the rest of the ban list i'm happy with most of the mons that got unbanned, it feels nice to try them from game to game and actually see them shine

 

Again, i don't have much experience in the pvp world and this is just my opinion from a new pvp player perspective, so please, enlighten me and why i'm wrong, i'm eager to learn more

 

ah yeah, ban staraptor.

 

EDIT:

After talking to someone they confirmed me that complex bans are not a thing for other tiers but OU (I wan't to clarify that I don't like complex bans at all, but togekiss sounds like a target for it) so yeah, that changes my perspective on it

Edited by BulkyBell
i can't spell words ok?
Posted

 

 

11 hours ago, gbwead said:

"Based on data" and "from a logical standpoint",  these statements mean nothing if you don't present any data and you only state your opinion.

1- Data is publicly accessible.

2- This is a Pokemon tier discussion. Not a thesis about some universal truth. Most things to be discussed are subjective, or were at some point. Most numbers or statistical leaps created to ease Pokemon movement discussions are still fundamentally subjective. People here are stating their opinions based on facts provided by either their experience or by the numbers provided. If you don't agree with their opinion, explain why. Completely disregarding an "opinion" in a thread that is supposed to gather different ones is completely idiotic. I understand you don't like an opinion that is different than your own, but at this point you are caio 2.0. 

 

 

Posted (edited)

Lucario thread before staraptor is wild

 

Lucario:

Has 2 different valid sets that both have some check, yes it comes with a surprise and yes late game is great, but you might be able to manage around

 

Staraptor:

The surprise is on the player who used it, he gets surprised about which pokemon you are about to sacrifice to him

Edited by razimove
Posted
33 minutes ago, pachima said:

1- Data is publicly accessible.

If the data is publicly accessible, that means you have no excuse to not point out exactly what numbers leads you to your conclusions.

 

4 minutes ago, pachima said:
  Hide contents

image.thumb.png.b0eab868e420ec9d615549af6f7c0a4a.png

  Hide contents

Hold up. Something's not quite right. 

  Reveal hidden contents

Ah, I see it now!

  Reveal hidden contents

image.png?ex=671f7b8c&is=671e2a0c&hm=c5c21d4195e140fe1bed211b6aff2440ffb146366d640040a968a5260f2f9959&=

 

 

 

 

So instead of making a rational argument as to why Lucario should be banned, you decide instead to go look at an old PZ post I made in 2021 and edit it to make it about Staraptor? For some reason, you don't play the game but you are pissed off that Staraptor is in the tier. That's fine, you're allowed to be mad, but at least go in the UU tier discussion request thread and ask for a Staraptor thread. I already know you are pathetic, but there is no need for you to show that side of you to everyone else by derailing this thread with your petty nonsense?

Posted
10 minutes ago, gbwead said:

If the data is publicly accessible, that means you have no excuse to not point out exactly what numbers leads you to your conclusions.

 

So instead of making a rational argument as to why Lucario should be banned, you decide instead to go look at an old PZ post I made in 2021 and edit it to make it about Staraptor? For some reason, you don't play the game but you are pissed off that Staraptor is in the tier. That's fine, you're allowed to be mad, but at least go in the UU tier discussion request thread and ask for a Staraptor thread. I already know you are pathetic, but there is no need for you to show that side of you to everyone else by derailing this thread with your petty nonsense?

You are partially right. I am not pissed off that Staraptor is in the tier. I am sad that the tier dropped 30% in usage when compared to the last first month of the season. Everyone, especially TC, should be looking at these numbers and discussing them. Instead, we have a very vocal minority that believes this is irrelevant and keeps lying about how the tier is diverse and how more people are playing it now. No, they aren't. Even though we had massive changes and changes always lead to a surge in usage, numbers are extremely lacking, and will get progressively worse as the season drags on. I already know you will run circles around these numbers to fit whatever you see. I don't care. Numbers are numbers. You asked for numbers. I get you numbers. 

 

You are also right. The post was better fit to the UU tier discussion request thread. However, I believe Staraptor deserves its own thread much more than Lucario does. I also don't believe in discussing a less problematic issue before dealing with the most problematic ones. 

 

I may be pathetic, but this doesn't derail the thread at all. Pointing out your hipocrisy that has been saturating all your posts non-stop helps others understand by how much they should be willing to listen to whatever you keep claiming. Be consistent in your own words. That's all I ask. If you can't, then I have every right to point it out for everyone to see. 

 

 

Posted (edited)

I don’t mind TC dropping things that seem "broken," but they should be banned very quickly once it's established they are for sure broken. Lucario & Staraptor should've been gone ages ago, near like day 2-3.

 

I feel people in general are being dishonest on both sides; as one side wants a huge messy chaotic tier (because they hate how it was before: a lot of stall) and the other wants it to be exactly how it was before. Where is the middle ground? 

Edited by Luke
Posted
31 minutes ago, pachima said:

You are partially right. I am not pissed off that Staraptor is in the tier. I am sad that the tier dropped 30% in usage when compared to the last first month of the season. Everyone, especially TC, should be looking at these numbers and discussing them. Instead, we have a very vocal minority that believes this is irrelevant and keeps lying about how the tier is diverse and how more people are playing it now. No, they aren't. Even though we had massive changes and changes always lead to a surge in usage, numbers are extremely lacking, and will get progressively worse as the season drags on. I already know you will run circles around these numbers to fit whatever you see. I don't care. Numbers are numbers. You asked for numbers. I get you numbers. 

So when I ask you to back up your statements with actual numbers, you do this? Really? The only number here is that 30% more usage in July. I agree, the tier is less popular in October than July. Then you talk about diversity, people lying, the tier getting progressively worse, etc. Where are the numbers to back up these statements? Oh right, nothing once again. 

Can you please answer this? Have you played the tier or just spectated? Since you don't have anything tangible to back up your statements, you should at least let people know that what you are saying is based on your experience as a player or as a spectator.

 

31 minutes ago, pachima said:

You are also right. The post was better fit to the UU tier discussion request thread. However, I believe Staraptor deserves its own thread much more than Lucario does. I also don't believe in discussing a less problematic issue before dealing with the most problematic ones. 

If you don't believe in discussing a less problematic issue before dealing with the most problematic ones, you have very little to contribute in a Lucario thread then.

 

31 minutes ago, pachima said:

I may be pathetic, but this doesn't derail the thread at all. Pointing out your hipocrisy that has been saturating all your posts non-stop helps others understand by how much they should be willing to listen to whatever you keep claiming. Be consistent in your own words. That's all I ask. If you can't, then I have every right to point it out for everyone to see. 

You ask me to be consistent with my own words by creating a fake post with my name on it where I say that Staraptor is banworthy??? WTF. This is so deranged, I don't even know where to begin.


I guess this could point out my hipocrisy if I was fighting for Staraptor to stay in the tier, but it turns out that I haven't given my opinion about Staraptor yet and why would I since this is a Lucario thread. I'm just assuming that's your reasoning, but I'm not a psychiatrist so I'm sure how to rationalize your delusions?! 

 

For the record, I do believe Staraptor is significantly more problematic than Lucario since I don't see Lucario problematic at all right now. I could see Staraptor as banworthy unlike Lucario.  

 

Posted

@gbwead, @pachima Why you guys always argue with eachother in these threads y'all are grown-up men.

 The Tier Council wants to get your inputs to the topic, such as:

- Is Lucario Offensive Uber Chacteristics in your opinion?

- Does Lucario affect teambuilding in an unhealthy manner?

- Or do you feel that Lucario has enough counterplay or can have that counterplay as metagame develops? Or is it too early to tell yet?

They asked for your input just give it and move on. If you don't like eachother just ignore the post and move on. You guys derailing these threads as important members of the community it only works against these discussion and game in general.

Posted
20 minutes ago, Luke said:

I feel people in general are being dishonest on both sides; as one side wants a huge messy chaotic tier (because they hate how it was before: a lot of stall) and the other wants it to be exactly how it was before. Where is the middle ground? 

I may disagree here. The side that support the drop didn't wanted a "huge messy chaotic tier", we understand its gonna be a mess at first, but the goal is cleary a better tier in the end (we know we could be wrong tho). While in the other side, they know the tier was shit, but refuse any kind of try to change and dont provide any better solution.

Posted
20 minutes ago, Makarovs said:

I may disagree here. The side that support the drop didn't wanted a "huge messy chaotic tier", we understand its gonna be a mess at first, but the goal is cleary a better tier in the end (we know we could be wrong tho). While in the other side, they know the tier was shit, but refuse any kind of try to change and dont provide any better solution.

I agree with you, but I also think people offered solutions that were ignored, I can think of a few. Both sides arent necessarily wrong, but as is, neither side really got anything done towards a healthy environment on the tier. Sure rn its more fun, chaos is fun, but is that how UU should be? 

Posted

Now that I've come to look at Staraptor more closely, it absolutely feels like an Offensive Ubers to me in UU. My biggest concern pre-BL release was Lucario and when I saw the numbers in terms of usage and winrate, it just confirmed my concerns. That's why I was pushing for Lucario thread to come out asap. Now that I've taken a closer look at Staraptor, I think it is undeniably Offensive Ubers in UU environment - even more so than Lucario. It has almost no counters whatsoever in the "relevant" portion of UU metagame. Lucario can be awkwardly countered against but Staraptor simply just can't. I apologize for focusing on the wrong Pokemon to begin with, I hope we can get a Staraptor thread out as soon as possible.

 

But I think some of the comments are just way over the top in terms of aggression right now, jeez.

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