The Reintroduction of UU

[fredrichnietze]

252+ Atk Choice Band Dodrio Drill Peck vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Scizor: 73-87 (41.2 - 49.1%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery
0 Atk Scizor Steel Wing vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Dodrio: 67-79 (49.6 - 58.5%) -- 98.4% chance to 2HKO
 

needs max def to switch in and not get 2hko's by adamant cb dodrio. since it can only 2hko dodrio it has to morning sun spam to try to get ahead enough to hit back. assuming morning sun is pp maxed it should be able to do it baring crit, but it'll be taking a lot of dpecks and it's about 50/50. 

[gbwead]

4 minutes ago, fredrichnietze said:

252+ Atk Choice Band Dodrio Drill Peck vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Scizor: 73-87 (41.2 - 49.1%) -- guaranteed 3HKO after Leftovers recovery
0 Atk Scizor Steel Wing vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Dodrio: 67-79 (49.6 - 58.5%) -- 98.4% chance to 2HKO
 

needs max def to switch in and not get 2hko's by adamant cb dodrio. since it can only 2hko dodrio it has to morning sun spam to try to get ahead enough to hit back. assuming morning sun is pp maxed it should be able to do it baring crit, but it'll be taking a lot of dpecks and it's about 50/50. 

Ya the odds don't look that good. I was calcing with Jolly Dodrio :/

 

I have seen some talk about Houndoom life orb being overly strong. Doesn't Miltank shut it down?

Edited May 9, 2016 by lamerb

[DoubleJ]

Miltank sits on face and will be a Curse monster when paired with Doom. Looking for Breloom revenge kills on the daily. 

[notthemaster]

Is it broken again??? cause I've been on matchmaking waiting with other people and we dont get paired or anything.

[Liberalisme]

7 hours ago, lamerb said:

Ya the odds don't look that good. I was calcing with Jolly Dodrio :/

 

I have seen some talk about Houndoom life orb being overly strong. Doesn't Miltank shut it down?

Houndoom is really strong with LO. Haven't played that many battles though. It's hard to counter. Haven't seen any Miltank yet. Can't wait for the first UU tourney's. So far it looks like a great meta. 

[DoubleJ]

Quick little assessment while I've been playing: STAB Priority is God-tier late game with everyone and their mama relying on the numerous squishy sweepers available to us now. Personally, I'm not really seeing any 'one thing' that's overtly broken, but with the high powered offense running amok I am yet to see a viable stall team (looks to Zebra and gbwead). Breloom, Houndoom, and Dodrio right now are the top playmakers, but so far there has been quite a bit of diversity between teams that I've seen. 

 

Is it a healthy meta? Idk. 

Is it diverse? Very.

Do I like to play it? You know it. 

[BurntZebra]

1 minute ago, DoubleJ said:

Quick little assessment while I've been playing: STAB Priority is God-tier late game with everyone and their mama relying on the numerous squishy sweepers available to us now. Personally, I'm not really seeing any 'one thing' that's overtly broken, but with the high powered offense running amok I am yet to see a viable stall team (looks to Zebra and gbwead). Breloom, Houndoom, and Dodrio right now are the top playmakers, but so far there has been quite a bit of diversity between teams that I've seen. 

 

Is it a healthy meta? Idk. 

Is it diverse? Very.

Do I like to play it? You know it. 

I've been trying to figure out a team that can actually be remotely defensive. Houndoom limits a lot of the defensive pokemon that could have potential use in the meta. Lunatone and solrock could be interesting answers to dodrio+miltank+other normal/ground types, but houndoom can come in vs non ancient power lunatone and basically ko lunatone with pursuit. Solrock is better off than lunatone as it'll actually be running earthquake, but doesn't have the special defense or special attack. Crawdaunt also seems pretty hard to counter (basically kos vileplume if any prior damage is done to vileplume). Other offensive pokemon like scizor require pretty specific counters (basically just slowking to counter it).

 

I think the diversity (I have not seen any UU, but I'll take your word for it) would most likely be due to people not really knowing what to run. Once someone successfully runs a team and wins an official tournament with it, people will begin to copy the common team archetype. It's happened basically every time we have a new meta and I wouldn't be surprised if it happened again.  

[DoubleJ]

3 minutes ago, BurntZebra said:

I've been trying to figure out a team that can actually be remotely defensive. Houndoom limits a lot of the defensive pokemon that could have potential use in the meta. Lunatone and solrock could be interesting answers to dodrio+miltank+other normal/ground types, but houndoom can come in vs non ancient power lunatone and basically ko lunatone with pursuit. Solrock is better off than lunatone as it'll actually be running earthquake, but doesn't have the special defense or special attack. Crawdaunt also seems pretty hard to counter (basically kos vileplume if any prior damage is done to vileplume). Other offensive pokemon like scizor require pretty specific counters (basically just slowking to counter it).

 

I think the diversity (I have not seen any UU, but I'll take your word for it) would most likely be due to people not really knowing what to run. Once someone successfully runs a team and wins an official tournament with it, people will begin to copy the common team archetype. It's happened basically every time we have a new meta and I wouldn't be surprised if it happened again.  

I can agree with everything you wrote here. Houndoom is certainly pretty troubling considering how crippling it is to almost anything that can step in and cover the tier defensively. Unfortunately, there is another amazing Pursuit user waiting right behind Houndoom and that's Absol. Fortunately it doesn't have STAB Flamethrower to handle Steelix or Vileplume as easily, but it still puts a beatdown (and even more so) on Psychic-types, and most walls in general. 

 

UU right now is really messy, but as you said, give it time and see what actually becomes popular and how PokeMMO forms the meta. 

[Liberalisme]

8 hours ago, DoubleJ said:

Quick little assessment while I've been playing: STAB Priority is God-tier late game with everyone and their mama relying on the numerous squishy sweepers available to us now. Personally, I'm not really seeing any 'one thing' that's overtly broken, but with the high powered offense running amok I am yet to see a viable stall team (looks to Zebra and gbwead). Breloom, Houndoom, and Dodrio right now are the top playmakers, but so far there has been quite a bit of diversity between teams that I've seen. 

 

Is it a healthy meta? Idk. 

Is it diverse? Very.

Do I like to play it? You know it. 

For me UU is more fun then it was before. I agree with you 100%. I used Scarfed Absol so I can deal with Houndoom, it is surprisingly (I hope I spelled this correct) good. With the extra speed Absol gets it is more easier to get some hard hits.

 

Your thoughts so far about Gardevoir and Miltank? 

 

I don't think Gardevoir is that amazing, it gets pursuit trapped so easily. Houndoom, Crawdaunt and Absol beats it easily. Still haven't seen any Miltank yet. 

[pachima]

What about specially defensive poliwrath for those houndooms

[Robofiend]

lol Walrein OP, plsban (looking at you, Nik, also props for sweeping with SD Tenta)

 

Overall, was very happy with UU today. I saw lots of pokemon do really well, but none without checks or counters. Old favorites like Doom, Plume, Loom and Kanga were all present and effective, but the boosted special attacks, Dodrio, Walrein, and defensive capabilities of Scizor helped to keep things interested. It really felt like I was watching a metagame, where everything was useful and strong but nothing was as sure of a bet as it was a couple weeks ago. Dodrio in particular was a bit terrifying, given the fact that no one was running rock/steel types, and Gardevoir and Miltank didn't make as strong a showing as I expected. Interestingly, I even saw lower ranked UU's like Quagsire, Lanturn, Blastoise, Armaldo and Walrein making some solid contributions for their teams in spite of all these new mega sweepers.

 

Overall, good showing. Like JJ said at some point, is it healthy? I'm not sure yet. But it is fun to watch and it seems a lot more diverse than the last UU tourney I watched, and that's cool. 

[BurntZebra]

Well I wasn't able to participate in the UU tournament, but when I got home, I watched a few of the matches to see what people were running. Currently, I'd say the most banworthy pokemon is houndoom currently. It has insane offensive and supporting abilities. Barely any pokemon can even switch in on the standard life orb set. Those few pokemon are usually crippled by one of houndoom's support moves, either super fang or will o wisp or destiny bond (a bit more than crippled). Houndoom's existence basically invalidates exeggutor, jynx, gardevoir, and other psychic or ghost types. Out of the 5 or so matches I've watched, every match has had at least one houndoom in it, if not two. It seems everyone runs some fighting type alongside houndoom, usually breloom (which is another point of discussion), or hitmonlee. Houndoom is just very centralizing and only has one true counter (miltank), which makes it a potential candidate for offensive uber as well.

 

Breloom also seems rather powerful. Although it didn't really gain that much from the update (choice scarf is meh and life orb is still inferior to choice band imo), the choice band set seems almost too good not to use. It can pretty much do everything. It can revenge kill most of the offensive pokemon with its stab priority and base 130 attack. It can wallbreak through any defensive pokemon, 2hko'ing everything bar exeggutor which is unviable due to houndoom existing. Ghost types can't take advantage of it because houndoom exists and haunter/misdreavus aren't very safe switches into breloom unless you protect scout for superpower/mach punch/normal move. 3 hit bullet seed nearly ohkos haunter and easily 2hkos misdreavus (or a ohko with 4-5 hits). To be honest, I think there should have been a bit more discussion breloom pre update, but I guess it didn't seem broken since everyone ran vileplume+a poison type which made it seem slightly less broken. It was a rather centralizing pokemon that I feel people weren't really aware of.

 

The problem of slowking and scizor still exists to some extent in the new meta. The best switch in to scizor is still slowking, as exeggutor is unviable and vileplume doesn't really consistently stop scizor+forced to give up a moveslot for hp fire. Slowking obviously has a lot of utility outside of stopping scizor, including stopping tentacruel, hitmonlee, walrein/omastar to an extent, and generally being annoying to people, but I'd definitely predict that there's a positive correlation between scizor usage and slowking usage, just like how it was in the older UU meta with scizor in it still. Houndoom not existing in UU would help with the scizor situation a bit as exeggutor could be safely run to some degree (still has to watch for absol), but still makes the meta rather centralizing around scizor and max hp/def hp fire pokemon.

 

I didn't see any match where dodrio was super powerful, which was surprising considering people were usually only running scizor and cradily as normal resists, which aren't exactly reliable in stopping dodrio. Choice band dodrio is extremely prediction reliant, and although life orb eases the prediction a lot, it makes dodrio get worn down even faster than before. Locking into low kick to hit steelix/omastar is risky as it leaves the player open to letting something get set up, or just being locked into a move that is generally weak outside of dealing with a select few normal resists. There seems to be enough speed control to not let dodrio plow through a team completely even if the other person doesn't run a normal resist. Choice scarfers and powerful priority users like breloom/hitmonlee/zangoose/scizor really hurt dodrio.

 

Gardevoir was a joke in the matches I saw as it usually just got pursuit trapped by houndoom immediately. It would be interesting to see gardevoir in UU where houndoom isn't on every team. Gardevoir would be seen on both defensive and offensive team archetypes, as it can either be a cleric/check pokemon like muk or it can be a very threatening calm mind sweeper when equipped with life orb and three offensive moves, or maybe somewhere in between. 

 

So basically, my plan for UU would be to ban houndoom, then see how breloom/scizor/gardevoir are. If either of those are problematic, then they could/would be banned (although I'm probably in the minority for thinking breloom is banworthy). And if dodrio becomes more problematic along the way, then it could be banned too.

 

And apparently sceptile is in the tier too! I didn't see any in the matches I've been spectating. Probably overshadowed by other drop downs and not many people had one prior to the update. The meta probably isn't too friendly to sceptile right now as houndoom shuts down special attacking sceptiles, while vileplume shuts down physically oriented ones. 

[NikhilR]

Houndoom + Zangoose + Sceptile are all too strong imo from what I observed.

 

Houndoom makes the presence of any psychic type useless and forces ppl to not run things like Exeggutor or Gardevoir (how many times have I been saying this ?!?!?!?). Also with Flash Fire, the synergy it has with Scizor is even more scary. Gard can be tested because I think there are quite a few good revenge killers like Sneasel / Absol but the Will O Wisp set will be cancer because no physical attacker can switch in on it. Sceptile is broken with sub / endeavor / giga / hp fire, due to lack of giga+fire resist types and the only pokemon I saw capable of taking advantage of it was DD Altaria, along with Doom. That high speed along with sub + orb / miracle seed means that you can't sack anything slower vs it incase it subs, which forces you to stay in no matter what and even if Sceptile "mispredicts", then endeavor wears down any wall. Zangoose is still OP with Silk Scarf. Here's where my beauty innovation comes into play. I run 252 attk evs, hit 123 speed (outspeed ada loom) and invest remaining in hp for my Goose. The normal goose set gets 2hko'd by most attacks but this spread makes most things 3hko which allows me to get to +4 and sweep with ease. Return + Low Kick breaks down any wall and Quick Attack can ko anything faster than me. At this point the only way to beat this is by having a pokemon that is faster than goose AND has access to a priority move. Most notably Scarf Scizor / Scarf Absol, Dodrio, Hitmonlee, Scarf Breloom but honestly I don't think is an ideal way of handling it. Scizor is cancer and will become too centralizing, forcing people to run hp fire exegg and slowking. 

 

All in all UU is pretty fun right now because of how many options you have, but some shit needs to go asap. 

[Robofiend]

4 hours ago, BurntZebra said:

Well I wasn't able to participate in the UU tournament, but when I got home, I watched a few of the matches to see what people were running. Currently, I'd say the most banworthy pokemon is houndoom currently. It has insane offensive and supporting abilities. Barely any pokemon can even switch in on the standard life orb set. Those few pokemon are usually crippled by one of houndoom's support moves, either super fang or will o wisp or destiny bond (a bit more than crippled). Houndoom's existence basically invalidates exeggutor, jynx, gardevoir, and other psychic or ghost types. Out of the 5 or so matches I've watched, every match has had at least one houndoom in it, if not two. It seems everyone runs some fighting type alongside houndoom, usually breloom (which is another point of discussion), or hitmonlee. Houndoom is just very centralizing and only has one true counter (miltank), which makes it a potential candidate for offensive uber as well.

 

Breloom also seems rather powerful. Although it didn't really gain that much from the update (choice scarf is meh and life orb is still inferior to choice band imo), the choice band set seems almost too good not to use. It can pretty much do everything. It can revenge kill most of the offensive pokemon with its stab priority and base 130 attack. It can wallbreak through any defensive pokemon, 2hko'ing everything bar exeggutor which is unviable due to houndoom existing. Ghost types can't take advantage of it because houndoom exists and haunter/misdreavus aren't very safe switches into breloom unless you protect scout for superpower/mach punch/normal move. 3 hit bullet seed nearly ohkos haunter and easily 2hkos misdreavus (or a ohko with 4-5 hits). To be honest, I think there should have been a bit more discussion breloom pre update, but I guess it didn't seem broken since everyone ran vileplume+a poison type which made it seem slightly less broken. It was a rather centralizing pokemon that I feel people weren't really aware of.

 

The problem of slowking and scizor still exists to some extent in the new meta. The best switch in to scizor is still slowking, as exeggutor is unviable and vileplume doesn't really consistently stop scizor+forced to give up a moveslot for hp fire. Slowking obviously has a lot of utility outside of stopping scizor, including stopping tentacruel, hitmonlee, walrein/omastar to an extent, and generally being annoying to people, but I'd definitely predict that there's a positive correlation between scizor usage and slowking usage, just like how it was in the older UU meta with scizor in it still. Houndoom not existing in UU would help with the scizor situation a bit as exeggutor could be safely run to some degree (still has to watch for absol), but still makes the meta rather centralizing around scizor and max hp/def hp fire pokemon.

 

I didn't see any match where dodrio was super powerful, which was surprising considering people were usually only running scizor and cradily as normal resists, which aren't exactly reliable in stopping dodrio. Choice band dodrio is extremely prediction reliant, and although life orb eases the prediction a lot, it makes dodrio get worn down even faster than before. Locking into low kick to hit steelix/omastar is risky as it leaves the player open to letting something get set up, or just being locked into a move that is generally weak outside of dealing with a select few normal resists. There seems to be enough speed control to not let dodrio plow through a team completely even if the other person doesn't run a normal resist. Choice scarfers and powerful priority users like breloom/hitmonlee/zangoose/scizor really hurt dodrio.

 

Gardevoir was a joke in the matches I saw as it usually just got pursuit trapped by houndoom immediately. It would be interesting to see gardevoir in UU where houndoom isn't on every team. Gardevoir would be seen on both defensive and offensive team archetypes, as it can either be a cleric/check pokemon like muk or it can be a very threatening calm mind sweeper when equipped with life orb and three offensive moves, or maybe somewhere in between. 

 

So basically, my plan for UU would be to ban houndoom, then see how breloom/scizor/gardevoir are. If either of those are problematic, then they could/would be banned (although I'm probably in the minority for thinking breloom is banworthy). And if dodrio becomes more problematic along the way, then it could be banned too.

 

And apparently sceptile is in the tier too! I didn't see any in the matches I've been spectating. Probably overshadowed by other drop downs and not many people had one prior to the update. The meta probably isn't too friendly to sceptile right now as houndoom shuts down special attacking sceptiles, while vileplume shuts down physically oriented ones. 

 

I'll agree that Houndoom is the best UU pokemon right now, but I'm not sure I can get behind banning it (yet). Frankly its defensive typing isn't that good, and part of the reason it's so offensively powerful right now is that people are still running old/bad UU's that can't handle it. I think previously bad defensive pokemon like Altaria or Quagsire might prove useful against it. As for your other points:

 

1. Scizor/Doom is a great core but I think the biggest flaw I see with them is the weakness to Fighting and Ground types, who were largely absent today. I think the meta hasn't adapted enough to make sense of these two.

 

2. I didn't see any Slowkings in the 8-10 matches I poked in on today, so I'm not necessarily seeing the Slowking/Scizor issue as much as I did before the new items (and when Scizor was UU). These two open up your team to Houndoom a lot and I don't see either as "too good" as of yet.

 

3. Gardevoir is definitely underqualified with all these Houndooms around, but so be it, as long as the meta's healthy. I don't think it needs to be A+ viable for the tier to be healthy, as it's similar to Grumpig in terms of the roles it can play. That said, I think that even if we banned Houndoom, Gardevoir would be ok.

 

4. Breloom is a great pokemon but I saw it suffering from two problems. The first is that CB Mach Punch can be a major loss of momentum, the second is that its low speed and bad typing leaves it vulnerable to the tier's best RK's and sweepers like Manectric, Swellow, Sceptile, Houndoom, Dodrio, etc. It can definitely break walls, but its reliance on Choice items, low defenses and low base speed all betray it in different scenarios.

 

4 hours ago, NikhilR said:

Houndoom + Zangoose + Sceptile are all too strong imo from what I observed.

 

Houndoom makes the presence of any psychic type useless and forces ppl to not run things like Exeggutor or Gardevoir (how many times have I been saying this ?!?!?!?). Also with Flash Fire, the synergy it has with Scizor is even more scary. Gard can be tested because I think there are quite a few good revenge killers like Sneasel / Absol but the Will O Wisp set will be cancer because no physical attacker can switch in on it. Sceptile is broken with sub / endeavor / giga / hp fire, due to lack of giga+fire resist types and the only pokemon I saw capable of taking advantage of it was DD Altaria, along with Doom. That high speed along with sub + orb / miracle seed means that you can't sack anything slower vs it incase it subs, which forces you to stay in no matter what and even if Sceptile "mispredicts", then endeavor wears down any wall. Zangoose is still OP with Silk Scarf. Here's where my beauty innovation comes into play. I run 252 attk evs, hit 123 speed (outspeed ada loom) and invest remaining in hp for my Goose. The normal goose set gets 2hko'd by most attacks but this spread makes most things 3hko which allows me to get to +4 and sweep with ease. Return + Low Kick breaks down any wall and Quick Attack can ko anything faster than me. At this point the only way to beat this is by having a pokemon that is faster than goose AND has access to a priority move. Most notably Scarf Scizor / Scarf Absol, Dodrio, Hitmonlee, Scarf Breloom but honestly I don't think is an ideal way of handling it. Scizor is cancer and will become too centralizing, forcing people to run hp fire exegg and slowking. 

 

All in all UU is pretty fun right now because of how many options you have, but some shit needs to go asap. 

I hear you on Houndoom, but I think Zangoose and Sceptile aren't quite there yet. Zangoose still struggles to swap in, even with some HP and both 

 

In general, I found the lack of Swellows today kinda surprising. It's the fastest sweeper available and it absolutely rips through Doom/Loom/Sceptile/Zangoose/Manetric, and pretty much anything else that's taken some LO recoil or Toxic damage. 

 

Overall good opinions, open to hearing more from other players for sure.

[KaynineXL]

Watch me vs bluejim.

 

You'll see the true sweeping power of Houndoom which shocked me to say the least. 

[Arimanius]

Well I was fucked up by a specs doom too who managed to give 2 critics in a row to my clefable and burn in the first flamethrower and then gave me another critic late game. Doom is scary is true, but I think there are pokemons that can deal with it yet like poliwrath, defensive altaria with eq, I think sp def sableye can deal with it somehow, so yeah I would say let's test it some more and then make a decision. I didn't see scizor any stronger for me it was just decent and only saw it trapping some swellows and hurting some pokemons with sd but never managed to sweep. Dodrio was pretty good but yeah there are a lot of steelix, scizor, cradily and some ghosts like misdreavus. I didn't see it sweeping so comfortable but it's still pretty strong if u predict well enough. Sceptile with endeavor was annoying like I thought it was going to be because of that speed, we have keep an eye on it. Gardevoir meh it was completely shut down by doom  

[gbwead]

Houndoom is good, but I'm not convinced it is broken. I was personnally playing Doom only because I saw it as the only reliable switch on Gardevoir which scared me a lot. 

Miltank counters Doom completly. Defensive Altaria, Omastar and Quagsire are scared only of hidden power ice/grass. Cradily is a pretty decent switch on Houndoom. Swift Choice Band Diglett can revenge kill Houndoom with ease. I used to play Magcargo in UU a long time ago, it probably isn't viable but it would work against Houndoom for ballsy people.

I don't believe Houndoom fits offensive Uber characteristics. It might be unhealthy for the tier, but at the same time it prevents Gardevoir from going out of control. 

 

I also disagree with some statements about Sceptile. The main reason why special Sceptile is not popular in UU is because of Tentacruel. Houndoom might be a factor, but it is not as important as Tentacruel Liquid Ooze. Most people probably don't have a physical or mixed Sceptile yet considering how useless it was in OU because of Weezing/Skarmory, but I assume it will be more popular with time. Vileplume has to handle Crawdaunt, Breloom and Scizor; adding Sceptile to the pokemons that Vileplume needs to wall might be too much.

 

Considering how Vileplume was dominating UU before, I don't think anyone will complain that Scizor forces it to drop a move to get HP fire. 

[pachima]

I wouldnt say houndoom shuts down exeggcutor completely. If you predict the switch and use sunny day, exeggcutor has chance to ohko doom with a super effective hidden power. With one layer of spikes, it is 100%.

[NikhilR]

11 minutes ago, pachima said:

I wouldnt say houndoom shuts down exeggcutor completely. If you predict the switch and use sunny day, exeggcutor has chance to ohko doom with a super effective hidden power. With one layer of spikes, it is 100%.

It shuts down defensive exeggutor completely though as that is one of the most reliable answers for Scizor. 

[LifeStyle]

Mixed Sceptile is good, really good.

I wonder why people aren't running Life Orb SD Breloom, yes it has its counters like everything else does, but unprepared/weared down teams can be easily swept by +2 LO Breloom.

Stuff like Dodrio, Swellow, Hitmonlee, Houndoom, etc will be ohkod by +2 LO Mach Punch with ez.

Garde isn't reliable with Houndoom around, at all.

All Ive seen from Omastar was Spikes set, which is meh, Rain Dance Life Orb Oma can be scary af for late game.

Scarf Mixed Nidoking is a good option to run in UU btw,  I've seen it put some work and it does nice.

[Gruul]

What surprised me though, is, that a pursuit user like Absol sits at around 5% usage whereas Sneasel is at over 11% (rip Sneasel NU) atm. Lapras and Hitmontop are also former NU powerhouses who could potentially go UU if I am not mistaken. I have NONE of them seen successful in the tournament. I am excited how NU will look if it stays like that (fear that Grumpig).

[BurntZebra]

6 hours ago, Robofiend said:

 

I'll agree that Houndoom is the best UU pokemon right now, but I'm not sure I can get behind banning it (yet). Frankly its defensive typing isn't that good, and part of the reason it's so offensively powerful right now is that people are still running old/bad UU's that can't handle it. I think previously bad defensive pokemon like Altaria or Quagsire might prove useful against it. As for your other points:

 

1. Scizor/Doom is a great core but I think the biggest flaw I see with them is the weakness to Fighting and Ground types, who were largely absent today. I think the meta hasn't adapted enough to make sense of these two.

 

2. I didn't see any Slowkings in the 8-10 matches I poked in on today, so I'm not necessarily seeing the Slowking/Scizor issue as much as I did before the new items (and when Scizor was UU). These two open up your team to Houndoom a lot and I don't see either as "too good" as of yet.

 

3. Gardevoir is definitely underqualified with all these Houndooms around, but so be it, as long as the meta's healthy. I don't think it needs to be A+ viable for the tier to be healthy, as it's similar to Grumpig in terms of the roles it can play. That said, I think that even if we banned Houndoom, Gardevoir would be ok.

 

4. Breloom is a great pokemon but I saw it suffering from two problems. The first is that CB Mach Punch can be a major loss of momentum, the second is that its low speed and bad typing leaves it vulnerable to the tier's best RK's and sweepers like Manectric, Swellow, Sceptile, Houndoom, Dodrio, etc. It can definitely break walls, but its reliance on Choice items, low defenses and low base speed all betray it in different scenarios.

 

1. It's not really supposed to be a defensive core. It's an offensive core that's supposed to allow one of them to weaken counters for the other to sweep easily. 

 

2. I saw a decent amount of slowkings, although I expect it to become more common as it's pretty powerful. It has a lot of utility with its typing and defense/special defense. It's not immediately threatened by houndoom as it ohkos houndoom with surf and survives a life orb crunch.

 

3. I'd say gardevoir is a lot more than grumpig. Gardevoir has a better movepool and much higher special attack. Gardevoir has wish, will o wisp, thunderbolt, mean look, pain split, etc. Gardevoir also has two very useful abilities. I don't really know that you can claim gardevoir would be ok, if houndoom was banned. Calm mind psychic thunderbolt hp fire has pretty much perfect coverage and can sweep pretty easily. A bulky set with will o wisp also has pretty few switch ins too and could easily be centralizing.

 

4. Potentially losing momentum is better than getting swept by a +1 crawdaunt or manectric. Not much really "takes advantage" of a breloom being locked into mach punch even. I'd say breloom has above average typing, considering it gives it unique resists to water+dark+rock+ground, and has two very usable stabs. It's speed isn't too much of an issue. A swords dance life orb mach punch set ohkos all of the pokemon you just mentioned, so breloom revenge killing options are pretty slim. Relying on choice items isn't really a bad thing either. I wouldn't say aerodactyl is bad because it has to run a choice band. It's still a great pokemon even if its prediction reliant.    

[DoubleJ]

Love me some Houndoom since it is just a lovely wallbreaker. Unfortunately it just robs momentum so easily when it comes in on the many number of things it counters. It also happens to have decent speed, and there really hasn't been many Manectrics lately to revenge kill which I find odd. 

[Toast]

4 hours ago, DoubleJ said:

Love me some Houndoom since it is just a lovely wallbreaker. Unfortunately it just robs momentum so easily when it comes in on the many number of things it counters. It also happens to have decent speed, and there really hasn't been many Manectrics lately to revenge kill which I find odd. 

Even with manec, it's gonna be hard to revenge if doom hasn't taken much LO damage

 

252 SpA Life Orb Manectric Thunderbolt vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Houndoom: 109-130 (72.6 - 86.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

[DoubleJ]

5 minutes ago, Toast said:

Even with manec, it's gonna be hard to revenge if doom hasn't taken much LO damage

 

252 SpA Life Orb Manectric Thunderbolt vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Houndoom: 109-130 (72.6 - 86.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

252 Atk Life Orb Houndoom Crunch vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Manectric: 105-124 (72.4 - 85.5%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

 

Doom ain't staying in tho